STING26: Stable Isotope meeting 2026

The STING conference

More than 40 isotope biogeoscientists gathered in a cold and snowy Bern for the STING `Stable Isotope Meeting' in January 2026. The meeting aimed to bring together the community to discuss progress, breakthroughs, challenges and next steps regarding the use of isotopes to understand C and N cycling, in particular CH₄ and N₂O emissions.

The conference was organised in four sessions:

• Background and baseline measurements (Convener: Eliza Harris): Isotopic measurements at background and baseline stations provide essential insights into global and regional biogeochemical cycles. However, achieving the required levels of precision and accuracy presents significant challenges, necessitating advancements in instrumentation, calibration strategies, intercomparison initiatives, and standardized data processing workflows. In this session, we discussed advances in instrumentation and calibration, and considered how to address the next challenges in the field. Keynote speaker Heiko Moossen gave an excellent insight into the activities of the IsoLab at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Jena. Special guest Martin Vollmer from Empa showed us how the isotope community can learn from the successes of the AGAGE measurement network in high precision greenhouse gas monitoring.

• Rare Isotopes (Convener: Joachim Mohn): The clumped isotope approach measures differences in abundances of doubly substituted species, i.e. ¹³CH₃D for CH₄, relative to the expected stochastic distribution of atoms. The resulting delta values serve as proxies for formation temperature und thermodynamic equilibrium, while departure from equilibrium indicates contributions of kinetically controlled formation and consumption mechanisms, as well as post-generation processes. This session discussed contributions relating to analytical developments, lab based as well as field application studies and novel modelling approaches. Keynote speaker Mojhgan A. Haghnegahdar from the University of Maryland brought us up to date on the latest research in kinetic isotope effects relating to clumped CH₄ isotope fractionation. Special guest Christof Lorenz from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Garmisch gave an excellent presentation on a topic highly relevant to all the sessions of the meeting: Open and FAIR data services to promote collaboration, data sharing, and reproducible research.

Presentations and networking at STING26.

• Co-location of isotope measurements (Convener: Benjamin Wolf): Thorough knowledge on the relative contributions of different N₂O producing processes to the bulk emission is needed to develop tailored N₂O mitigation strategies, however, few methods are available for source partitioning. Labelling studies based on ¹⁵N and natural abundance approaches, especially considering N₂O site preference, can both be used to explore emission and consumption pathways, with different strengths and weaknesses. In this session, contributions showed experiments using both labelling and natural abundance approaches to unravel microbial and abiotic production pathways. Keynote speaker Caroline Buchen-Tschiskale from the Thünen Institute of Climate-Smart Agriculture gave a detailed overview of the development and state-of-the-art in this topic.

• Isotopes in Field Applications (Convener: Phillip Agredazywczuk): Isotope measurements can improve our understanding of biogeochemical processes in complex environments. However, interpreting isotopes across space and time remains challenging, particularly when distinguishing between overlapping processes in dynamic systems. The lack of community standards for data sharing via repositories further complicates upscaling and metaanalyses. This session showcased excellent contributions regarding innovative field applications, sampling methodologies for challenging conditions, data integration approaches, and case studies utilising isotope approaches to advance our understanding of biogeochemical processes across scales. Keynote speaker Jan Kaiser from the University of East Anglia showed a range of impressive measurements of the oxygen isotope anomaly from land sites to on board of research vessels.

Poster sessions at the conference.

Early career scientist presentation awards

We had so many excellent early career scientist presentations at STING. It is great to see the next generation of isotope biogeoscientists starting out in this field. The quality of the presentations under consideration for the early career scientist presentation award was very high and the judging committee had a challenging time selecting two prize recipients. We gave a special mention to Chloe Brashear from the University of Utrecht and to Craig Lils from the National Physical Laboratory. The prizes were awarded to Lorenz Allemann from the Grassland Sciences group at ETHZ and to Hannes Keck from Empa. The committee was very impressed by their clear introductions, great visuals, good structure, well supported results, and interesting conclusions. Congratulations, Hannes and Lorenz!

Hannes Keck (Empa) and Lorenz Allemann (ETHZ) were awarded the early career scientist presentation prizes.

Excursion to the Jungfraujoch

Following the conference, we visited the Jungfraujoch Research Station and Sphinx Laboratory to see some isotope biogeoscience in action. A number of isotope measurements are ongoing at the Jungfraujoch, including online CO₂ isotope measurements run by Empa, flask sampling following by isotopic analysis of CO₂ and CH₄ by the University of Bern, ICOS, and the Max Planck Institute IsoLab, ¹⁴C measurements of CO₂ and CH₄ made by the LARA Lab at the University of Bern and by ICOS. The STING group was not lucky with the weather but we still had an excellent visit and we were very glad to welcome this diverse group of scientists to the research station.

The conference was followed by a visit to the Jungfraujoch high altitude research station.

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the SNSF for supporting STING26 (IZSEZ0_238331) through the Scientific Exchanges program.

We would also like to thank the Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research for supporting STING26.

Many thanks to Vas Mandrakis for photography during the conference, including the images on this page. The image of the Jungfraujoch station is from the HFSJG website.