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Discuss “Nitrate fills atmosphere”

Emily Elliott, an assistant professor in the department of geology and planetary science at the University of Pittsburgh, led a team of researchers in investigating the link between the presence of nitrogen in the atmosphere and vehicle emissions.

The three-year study was published in American Chemical Society on Oct. 20.

Nitrogen is not only an essential constituent of key industrial compounds such as nitric acid, but is also an integral component of all living tissues and proteins.

A nitrate, which is one of the many salts found in nitric acid that forms as a result of the oxidation of nitrogen, is made up of one nitrogen and three oxygen atoms. Stable isotopes of nitrate form when an additional neutron is added to nitrate, changing its...

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