Variations in primary production and particulate carbon flux through the base of the euphotic zone at the site of the Sediment Trap Intercomparison Experiment (Panama Basin)

1984 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 189-206 ◽  
Author(s):  
James K. B. Bishop ◽  
John Marra
Keyword(s):  
Primary Production ◽  
Sediment Trap ◽  
Carbon Flux ◽  
Euphotic Zone ◽  
Particulate Carbon

Protist grazing contributes to microbial food web at the upper boundary of the twilight zone in the subarctic Pacific

2020 ◽  
Vol 636 ◽  
pp. 235-241 ◽  
Author(s):  
HM McNair ◽  
S Menden-Deuer
Keyword(s):  
Primary Production ◽  
Food Web ◽  
Single Cell ◽  
Euphotic Zone ◽  
Twilight Zone ◽  
Particulate Carbon ◽  
Surface Ocean ◽  
Tropical Environments ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Upper Boundary

Grazing by herbivorous protists (microzooplankton) is a major loss pathway of primary production in the surface ocean, yet its impact below the well-lit surface ocean is largely unknown. The upper boundary of the twilight zone is critically important to understanding carbon cycling and is often the depth of highest attenuation of particulate carbon flux. Available measurements of primary production and grazing below the well-lit surface ocean suggest that the upper boundary of the twilight zone may harbor active but poorly constrained food web processes. Previous grazing rates from the base of the euphotic zone were measured in subtropical and tropical environments. Thus, the impact of protist grazing on prey populations remains unknown in colder conditions at higher latitudes. To advance understanding and provide mechanistic insight into processes occurring at the base of the euphotic zone (0.4-0.7% PAR), we measured predation rates on both phytoplankton and heterotrophic prokaryotes in the North Pacific, using a novel method that amplified the grazing signal by concentrating the predator community, enabling detection of grazing rates far below previous limits. Protists consumed 0.6% of the phytoplankton population daily and 12% of daily heterotrophic prokaryote growth. These conservative rate measurements document marginal removal of phytoplankton even in these colder regimes, implying flows of energy from single-cell primary producers and prokaryotes to single-cell protists at rates far below previous detection limits in this twilight region of a low-productivity system.

scholarly journals The Ballast Effect in the Indian Ocean

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim Rixen ◽  
Birgit Gaye ◽  
Kay-Christian Emeis ◽  
Venkitasubramani Ramaswamy
Keyword(s):  
Organic Matter ◽  
Organic Carbon ◽  
Primary Production ◽  
Sediment Trap ◽  
Deep Sea ◽  
Carbon Flux ◽  
Arabian Sea ◽  
Co2 Uptake ◽  
Relative Importance ◽  
Organic Carbon Flux

Abstract. In this study, data obtained from a sediment trap experiments off South Java are analyzed and compared to satellite-derived information on primary production and data collected by deep-moored sediment traps in the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal. The aim was to study the relative importance of primary production and the ballast effect on the organic carbon export and the CO2 uptake of the biological carbon pumps. Therefore, data obtained from sediment trap experiments carried out in other ocean basins were also integrated into the data analysis and a four-box model was developed. Our data showed that the organic carbon flux in the highly-productive upwelling system in the Arabian Sea was similar to those in the low productive system off South Java. Off South Java as in other river-influenced regions, lithogenic matter supplied from land mainly controls the organic carbon flux via its ballast effect in sinking particles, whereas carbonate produced by marine organisms appears to be the main ballast material in the high productive regions. Since the carbonate flux tends to increase with an increasing export production, it is difficult to quantify the relative importance of productivity and the ballast effect on the organic carbon flux into the deep sea. However, the export of organic matter into the deep sea represents a loss of nutrients for the pelagic ecosystems, which needs to be balanced by mode water nutrient supply into the seasonal thermocline to sustain the productivity of the pelagic system. The amount of preformed nutrients utilized during the formation of the exported organic matter strongly influences the impact of the ballast effect on the CO2 uptake of the organic carbon pump. Accordingly, this is stronger at higher latitudes where preformed nutrients are formed than at lower latitudes where the euphotic zone is nutrient depleted. Nevertheless, the ballast effect enhances the export of organic matter into the deep sea and favors the sedimentation of organic matter in river-influenced regions. Since globally > 80 % of organic carbon burial occurs in river-dominated systems, the lithogenic ballast is assumed to play an important role in the Earth’s climate system on geological time scales.

scholarly journals Sinking rates and ballast composition of particles in the Atlantic Ocean: implications for the organic carbon fluxes to the deep ocean

2009 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 85-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. Fischer ◽  
G. Karakaş
Keyword(s):  
Organic Carbon ◽  
Atlantic Ocean ◽  
Sediment Trap ◽  
Carbon Flux ◽  
Coastal Upwelling ◽  
Production Systems ◽  
Deep Ocean ◽  
Biogeochemical Model ◽  
Carbonate Content ◽  
Organic Carbon Flux

Abstract. The flux of materials to the deep sea is dominated by larger, organic-rich particles with sinking rates varying between a few meters and several hundred meters per day. Mineral ballast may regulate the transfer of organic matter and other components by determining the sinking rates, e.g. via particle density. We calculated particle sinking rates from mass flux patterns and alkenone measurements applying the results of sediment trap experiments from the Atlantic Ocean. We have indication for higher particle sinking rates in carbonate-dominated production systems when considering both regional and seasonal data. During a summer coccolithophorid bloom in the Cape Blanc coastal upwelling off Mauritania, particle sinking rates reached almost 570 m per day, most probably due the fast sedimentation of densely packed zooplankton fecal pellets, which transport high amounts of organic carbon associated with coccoliths to the deep ocean despite rather low production. During the recurring winter-spring blooms off NW Africa and in opal-rich production systems of the Southern Ocean, sinking rates of larger particles, most probably diatom aggregates, showed a tendency to lower values. However, there is no straightforward relationship between carbonate content and particle sinking rates. This could be due to the unknown composition of carbonate and/or the influence of particle size and shape on sinking rates. It also remains noticeable that the highest sinking rates occurred in dust-rich ocean regions off NW Africa, but this issue deserves further detailed field and laboratory investigations. We obtained increasing sinking rates with depth. By using a seven-compartment biogeochemical model, it was shown that the deep ocean organic carbon flux at a mesotrophic sediment trap site off Cape Blanc can be captured fairly well using seasonal variable particle sinking rates. Our model provides a total organic carbon flux of 0.29 Tg per year down to 3000 m off the NW African upwelling region between 5 and 35° N. Simple parameterisations of remineralisation and sinking rates in such models, however, limit their capability in reproducing the flux variation in the water column.

Estimations of primary production and export production in the South China Sea based on sediment trap experiments

1998 ◽  
Vol 43 (7) ◽  
pp. 583-586 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jianfang Chen ◽  
Lianfu Zheng ◽  
M. G. Wiesner ◽  
Ronghua Chen ◽  
Yulong Zheng ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
South China Sea ◽  
Primary Production ◽  
South China ◽  
Sediment Trap ◽  
The South China Sea ◽  
The South ◽  
Export Production ◽  
China Sea

scholarly journals A stochastic, Lagrangian model of sinking biogenic aggregates in the ocean (SLAMS 1.0): model formulation, validation and sensitivity

2016 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 1455-1476 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tinna Jokulsdottir ◽  
David Archer
Keyword(s):  
Primary Production ◽  
Degradation Kinetics ◽  
Mechanistic Model ◽  
Euphotic Zone ◽  
Lagrangian Model ◽  
Zooplankton Grazing ◽  
Aggregate Model ◽  
Size Spectra ◽  
Sea Floor ◽  
Individual Particles

Abstract. We present a new mechanistic model, stochastic, Lagrangian aggregate model of sinking particles (SLAMS) for the biological pump in the ocean, which tracks the evolution of individual particles as they aggregate, disaggregate, sink, and are altered by chemical and biological processes. SLAMS considers the impacts of ballasting by mineral phases, binding of aggregates by transparent exopolymer particles (TEP), zooplankton grazing and the fractal geometry (porosity) of the aggregates. Parameterizations for age-dependent organic carbon (orgC) degradation kinetics, and disaggregation driven by zooplankton grazing and TEP degradation, are motivated by observed particle fluxes and size spectra throughout the water column. The model is able to explain observed variations in orgC export efficiency and rain ratio from the euphotic zone and to the sea floor as driven by sea surface temperature and the primary production rate and seasonality of primary production. The model provides a new mechanistic framework with which to predict future changes on the flux attenuation of orgC in response to climate change forcing.

The benthic geochemical record of late Holocene carbon flux in the northeast Atlantic

1995 ◽  
Vol 348 (1324) ◽  
pp. 221-227 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Organic Carbon ◽  
Carbon Flux ◽  
Late Holocene ◽  
Sediment Accumulation ◽  
Euphotic Zone ◽  
Natural Uranium ◽  
Water Interface ◽  
Northeast Atlantic ◽  
Organic Carbon Flux ◽  
Organic Carbon Burial

This study centered around a transect of high-resolution (multi) cores from the 20° W meridian, 60-18° N in the northeast Atlantic. It spans a range of primary productivity zones, and was used to quantify and examine the vertical flux of organic carbon from the euphotic zone (50 m deep) to the sediment—water interface, through the sediment mixed layer, to burial in late Holocene sediment. The disequilibrium between members of the natural uranium decay series ( 226 Ra, 210 Pb and 210 Po) - which track the biogenic flux through scavenging of the particle-reactive nuclides —was employed. Together with experimentally and observationally derived factors, these data were used to convert nuclide flux to organic carbon flux resulting in an estimate of the water column flux of organic carbon. At the sediment-water interface micro-oxygen electrodes were used to quantify the consumption of organic carbon by aerobic respiration. It was noted that the estimated organic carbon flux is strongly dependent on the intensity of bioturbation. The late Holocene organic carbon burial flux was calculated for selected cores from measured organic carbon profiles and sediment accumulation rates over approximately the last 10000 years. This combined approach reveals a strong spatial and temporal signal in the flux of organic carbon through the deep sea in the northeast Atlantic, and provides additional insight into the fate of carbon in this area of the ocean.

Primary Production and Phytoplankton in the Experimental Lakes Area, Northwestern Ontario, and other Low-Carbonate Waters, and a Liquid Scintillation Method for Determining 14C Activity in Photosynthesis

1971 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 189-201 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. W. Schindler ◽  
S. K. Holmgren
Keyword(s):  
Primary Production ◽  
Liquid Scintillation ◽  
Species Abundance ◽  
Euphotic Zone ◽  
Phytoplankton Production ◽  
Phytoplankton Species ◽  
Experimental Lakes Area ◽  
Phytoplankton Species Composition ◽  
Northwestern Ontario ◽  
Filtration Error

A modified 14C method is described for measuring phytoplankton production in low-carbonate waters. The procedure includes the use of the Arthur and Rigler (Limnol. Oceanogr. 12: 121–124, 1967) technique for determining filtration error, liquid scintillation counting for determining the radioactivity of membrane filters and stock 14C solutions, and gas chromatography for measuring total CO2.Primary production, chlorophyll a, and total CO2 were measured for two dates in midsummer from each of several lakes in the Experimental Lakes Area (ELA), ranging from 1 to 1000 ha in area and from 2 to 117 m in maximum depth. Phytoplankton species abundance and biomass were determined for the same dates. Production ranged from 0.02 to 2.12 gC/m3∙day and from 0.179 to 1.103 g C/m2∙day. Chlorophyll ranged from 0.4 to 44 mg/m3 and from 5 to 98 mg/m2 in the euphotic zone. The corresponding ranges for live phytoplankton biomass were 120–5400 mg/m3 and 2100–13,400 mg/m2. Chrysophyceae dominated the phytoplankton of most of the lakes.A system for classifying the lakes in terms of phytoplankton species composition and production–depth curves is developed.

Net primary production and ecosystem carbon flux of Brazilian tropical savanna ecosystems from eddy covariance and inventory methods

2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Louis Vourlitis ◽  
Osvaldo Borges Pinto Jr. ◽  
Higo José Dalmagro ◽  
Paulo Arruda ◽  
Francisco de Almeida Lobo ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Primary Production ◽  
Eddy Covariance ◽  
Carbon Flux ◽  
Net Primary Production ◽  
Tropical Savanna ◽  
Ecosystem Carbon

Quantum yield of the marine benthic microflora of near-shore coastal Penang, Malaysia

2005 ◽  
Vol 56 (7) ◽  
pp. 1047 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. McMinn ◽  
S. Sellah ◽  
W. A. Wan Ab. Llah ◽  
M. Mohammad ◽  
F. Md. Sidik Merican ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Primary Production ◽  
Suspended Solids ◽  
Euphotic Zone ◽  
Water Clarity ◽  
Quantum Yields ◽  
Chl A ◽  
Near Shore ◽  
High Concentrations ◽  
A Minor ◽  
Reduced Water

Benthic microalgal communities often contribute more than 30% of the primary production of shallow coastal and estuarine areas. At Muka Head Penang (Pulau Pinang) and the Songsong Islands (Pulau Songsong), Kedah, Malaysia, high concentrations of suspended solids and phytoplankton biomass (10.6 mg Chl a m−3) has reduced water clarity such that the euphotic zone of these areas is less than 2 m and 3 m deep respectively. The benthic microalgal communities, which were composed of the diatom genera Cocconeis, Fragilaria, Paralia and Pleurosigma, had a low biomass, had low maximum quantum yields (0.325 ± 0.129), were poorly adapted to their light environment and were constantly light limited. These characteristics suggest that the benthic microalgal communities were likely to have made only a minor contribution to the total primary production of the area.

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