Peat Basics
This type of dead plant material builds up over thousands of years in wet conditions.
What is peat?
This is what we call fires that burn underground through winter and restart in spring.
What are zombie fires?
This gas is released into the air when peat burns.
What is CO₂ (or carbon dioxide)?
This happens to Earth when more CO₂ is released into the atmosphere.
What is it gets warmer (or climate change)?
This is the independent variable of our experiment.
What is temperature or water temperature.
Peat forms in these types of conditions, which slow down decomposition.
What are wet or low-oxygen conditions?
This is where zombie fires burn during the winter months.
What is underground (or in the peat layer)?
Carbon moves from the air into plants and then into this for long-term storage.
What is peat?
This is the first step in the zombie fire feedback loop.
What is zombie fires burn through peat?
What is CO2 or carbon dioxide.
This is how long peat can store carbon before it is disturbed.
What is thousands of years (or 5,000-10,000 years)?
Unlike regular fires, zombie fires can reignite in spring without needing this.
What is a new spark (or new ignition source)?
When comparing healthy vs. burning peat, this one stores carbon while the other releases it
What is healthy peat?
When Earth warms due to more CO₂, this happens to peat ecosystems, increasing fire risk.
What is they become drier (or conditions become warmer and drier)?
What the yeast in our experiment similar to in a zombie fire system.
What are decomposers.
When dead plants break down at this speed, peat can form and store carbon.
What is slowly?
This is why zombie fires are hard to detect and put out.
What is because they burn underground (or are hidden)?
Carbon that took thousands of years to store in peat is released in this amount of time when fires burn.
What is weeks or months (or one season)?
This is why the zombie fire cycle is called a feedback loop - it does this instead of stopping.
What is it keeps repeating (or continues/makes the problem worse)?
This is what peat is similar to in our experiment.
What is sugar.
This is the main reason why peat ecosystems store so much carbon - dead plants do this very slowly in wet conditions.
What is decompose (or break down)?
In 2020, Arctic zombie fires released this many million tons of CO₂, equal to what a small country produces in a year.
What is 140 million tons?
In healthy peat, this process happens slowly, allowing dead plants to build up and store carbon.
What is decomposition (or breaking down)?
These are the four steps in order: fires burn peat, carbon is released, Earth warms, and this fourth thing happens to start the cycle again.
What is peat dries out (increasing fire risk)?
This is the process that our yeast uses to transfer energy from sugar to CO2.
What is cellular respiration.