Wouldn’t it be great if one could chemically fingerprint wood to support timber tracing? In the brand-new paper led by Laura Boeschoten published in Science of the Total Environment (STOTEN) we’ve set the first steps. Find it open access here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969722049762?via%3Dihub
Our take home messages:
1. Wood elemental composition resembles that in soil.
2. Wood elemental composition is associated with soil organic matter and clay fraction.
3. Elemental composition is conserved between sapwood and heartwood.
4. Elemental composition could differentiate wood obtained from two Cameroon forest sites with 97.3% accuracy.
So, we have a promising new tracing tool. More news will follow as we expand our dataset!
Collaborators: Laura E. Boeschoten, Ute Sass-Klaassen, Mart Vlam, Rob N.J. Comans, Gerwin F. Koopmans, Barbara Rocha Venâncio Meyer-Sand, Steve N. Tassiamba, Martin T. Tchamba, Herman T. Zanguim, Pascaline T. Zemtsa and Pieter A. Zuidema