Chemometric Tools in Chemical Fractionation Data of Soil Samples from Five Antarctic Research Stations

The aim of this study was to carry out a broad chemical investigation of selected soil samples from Antarctica, near different Antarctic scientific stations. Soil samples collected in background reference sites, with minimal human impact, far away from the stations were used as control samples. Anthropogenic places at the vicinity of the following stations Frei Montalva and Escudero (Chile), Great Wall (China), Bellingshausen (Russia) and Artigas (Uruguay) were studied as a priori human impacted sites. The sequential extraction procedure (SEP) based on the BCR (Community Bureau of Reference) protocol was applied for Cu, Mn and Zn determination. With the help of PCA (principal component analysis) and PARAFAC (parallel factor analysis) methods, meaningful information was extracted from the raw data obtained from SEP procedure. Soil samples affected by the scientific stations are associated with higher heavy metal contents (especially Cu and Zn, between the investigated metals, in the most labile fractions of the SEP applied). This pollution signal is associated with diesel use for the energy generation by the Antarctic stations.