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<front>
<journal-meta>
<journal-id journal-id-type="publisher">EGUsphere</journal-id>
<journal-title-group>
<journal-title>EGUsphere</journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="publisher">EGUsphere</abbrev-journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="nlm-ta">EGUsphere</abbrev-journal-title>
</journal-title-group>
<issn pub-type="epub"></issn>
<publisher><publisher-name>Copernicus Publications</publisher-name>
<publisher-loc>Göttingen, Germany</publisher-loc>
</publisher>
</journal-meta>
<article-meta>
<article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.5194/egusphere-2026-411</article-id>
<title-group>
<article-title>Distinct dual-isotopic signatures of major methane sources in South Asia</article-title>
</title-group>
<contrib-group><contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Yao</surname>
<given-names>Peng</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1265-7849</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Belec</surname>
<given-names>Katja</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Holmstrand</surname>
<given-names>Henry</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Balacky</surname>
<given-names>Josh</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Salam</surname>
<given-names>Abdus</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5609-6828</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Budhavant</surname>
<given-names>Krishnakant</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2753-3192</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff3">
<sup>3</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff4">
<sup>4</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Manoj</surname>
<given-names>Mohanan Remani</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8155-777X</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Joy</surname>
<given-names>Khaled Shaifullah</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7784-4530</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff5">
<sup>5</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Hossain</surname>
<given-names>Md. Alamin</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Singh</surname>
<given-names>Atinderpal</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff6">
<sup>6</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Patel</surname>
<given-names>Anil</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff7">
<sup>7</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff8">
<sup>8</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff9">
<sup>9</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Rastogi</surname>
<given-names>Neeraj</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4532-7827</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff7">
<sup>7</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Mallik</surname>
<given-names>Chinmay</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff10">
<sup>10</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Ram</surname>
<given-names>Kirpa</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff11">
<sup>11</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Singh</surname>
<given-names>Gyanesh Kumar</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff12">
<sup>12</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff13">
<sup>13</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Gustafsson</surname>
<given-names>Örjan</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1922-0527</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
</contrib-group><aff id="aff1">
<label>1</label>
<addr-line>Department of Environmental Science (ACES) and the Bolin Centre for Climate Research,  Stockholm University, Stockholm 10691, Sweden</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff2">
<label>2</label>
<addr-line>Department of Chemistry, University of Dhaka, Dhaka 1000, Bangladesh</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff3">
<label>3</label>
<addr-line>Divecha Centre for Climate Change, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore 560012, India</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff4">
<label>4</label>
<addr-line>Maldives Climate Observatory-Hanimaadhoo (MCOH), Maldives Meteorological Services, H.  Dh. Hanimaadhoo 02020, Maldives</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff5">
<label>5</label>
<addr-line>Department of Chemistry, Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA-19104, United States</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff6">
<label>6</label>
<addr-line>Department of Environmental Studies, University of Delhi, Delhi, 110007, India</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff7">
<label>7</label>
<addr-line>Geosciences Division, Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad 380009, India</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff8">
<label>8</label>
<addr-line>Bagchi School of Public Health, Ahmedabad University, Ahmedabad 380009, Gujarat, India</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff9">
<label>9</label>
<addr-line>The Climate Institute, Ahmedabad University, Ahmedabad 380009, Gujarat, India</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff10">
<label>10</label>
<addr-line>Department of Atmospheric Science, Central University of Rajasthan, Ajmer 305801, India</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff11">
<label>11</label>
<addr-line>Department of Chemistry, Institute of Science, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi 221005,  India</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff12">
<label>12</label>
<addr-line>Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, Kanpur, 208016, India</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff13">
<label>13</label>
<addr-line>Air Quality and Aerosol Metrology (AQAM) Group, National Physical Laboratory (NPL),  Teddington, London TW11 0LW, UK</addr-line>
</aff>
<pub-date pub-type="epub">
<day>20</day>
<month>02</month>
<year>2026</year>
</pub-date>
<volume>2026</volume>
<fpage>1</fpage>
<lpage>60</lpage>
<permissions>
<copyright-statement>Copyright: &#x000a9; 2026 Peng Yao et al.</copyright-statement>
<copyright-year>2026</copyright-year>
<license license-type="open-access">
<license-p>This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this licence, visit <ext-link ext-link-type="uri"  xlink:href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/</ext-link></license-p>
</license>
</permissions>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-411/">This article is available from https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-411/</self-uri>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-411/egusphere-2026-411.pdf">The full text article is available as a PDF file from https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-411/egusphere-2026-411.pdf</self-uri>
<abstract>
<p>Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas contributing significantly to global warming. South Asia is a major methane emission region, yet source-diagnostic isotopic signatures remain poorly constrained, limiting top-down source attribution. To address this gap, we conducted extensive sampling and isotopic analyses of major methane sources in South Asia. Our results reveal substantial deviations of South Asian methane source fingerprints from global means. Methane from C3 biomass burning is more depleted in &amp;delta;&lt;sup&gt;13&lt;/sup&gt;C (&amp;ndash;30.9&amp;plusmn;2.2 &amp;permil;) but more enriched in &amp;delta;&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt;H (&amp;ndash;201&amp;plusmn;18 &amp;permil;), while ruminant methane (C3) is strongly depleted in both &amp;delta;&lt;sup&gt;13&lt;/sup&gt;C (&amp;ndash;68.7&amp;plusmn;0.5 &amp;permil;) and &amp;delta;&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt;H (&amp;ndash;343&amp;plusmn;6 &amp;permil;). In contrast, rice paddy methane is more enriched in &amp;delta;&lt;sup&gt;13&lt;/sup&gt;C (&amp;ndash;53.8&amp;plusmn;0.8 &amp;permil;) and &amp;delta;&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt;H (&amp;ndash;311&amp;plusmn;6 &amp;permil;), with their ratios signaling pre-emission oxidation. Wastewater methane shows enriched &amp;delta;&lt;sup&gt;13&lt;/sup&gt;C (&amp;ndash;45.0&amp;plusmn;2.4 &amp;permil;) and depleted &amp;delta;&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt;H (&amp;ndash;350&amp;plusmn;10 &amp;permil;) relative to global means, with minimal oxidation or spatial variation. These pronounced regional differences highlight the importance of using regionally constrained source fingerprints in isotope-based source apportionment. A global synthesis further shows that &amp;delta;&lt;sup&gt;13&lt;/sup&gt;C signatures of biomass burning and ruminant methane are primarily controlled by C3/C4 feedstocks, whereas &amp;delta;&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt;H is relatively insensitive to substrate type. Methane from rice paddies and wetlands exhibits strong latitudinal gradients worldwide. Combining emission inventories with source-specific isotope fingerprints reveals a mismatch with atmospheric methane in South Asia, suggesting an overestimation of rice paddy emissions and/or an underestimation of other microbial sources. These findings demonstrate the utility of top-down dual-isotope constraints to refine regional methane budgets and mitigation strategies.</p>
</abstract>
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<funding-group>
<award-group id="gs1">
<funding-source>Vetenskapsrådet</funding-source>
<award-id>2017-01601</award-id>
</award-group>
<award-group id="gs2">
<funding-source>Svenska Forskningsrådet Formas</funding-source>
<award-id>2023-01234</award-id>
</award-group>
</funding-group>
</article-meta>
</front>
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<back>
</back>
</article>