Stagnation in the South Pacific

A team led by geochemist Dr. Katharina Pahnke from Oldenburg has discovered important evidence that the rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels at the end of the last ice age was triggered by changes in the Antarctic Ocean. The researchers from the University of Oldenburg's Institute for Chemistry and Biology of the Marine Environment (ICBM), the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology in Bremen and the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) were able to demonstrate that the deep South Pacific was strongly stratified during the last ice age, and could thus have facilitated long-term, deep-sea storage of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2). The study, which has now been published in the academic journal Science, also indicates that in the course of the warming following the end of the last ice age the mixing of the deep water masses increased, releasing stored CO2 and enhancing global warming.

Snapshot from aboard RV Polarstern [Credit: Mario Hoppmann]

The Southern Ocean plays an important role in climate events because CO2 can be absorbed from the atmosphere into the ocean. When increased amounts of dust are deposited in the seawater, microscopic algae multiply because the iron contained in the dust acts as a fertilizer. When these single celled algae die, they sink to the ocean floor, taking the sequestered carbon dioxide with them. To ensure long-term removal of the CO2 from the atmosphere, however, it must be stored in stable conditions in deep water over long periods of time.

In order to find out how water masses in the deep South Pacific have developed over the last 30,000 years, the team recovered sediment cores from water depths of between 3,000 and more than 4,000 metres during an expedition of the research vessel "Polarstern" to the South Pacific. The geochemists Dr. Chandranath Basak and Dr. Henning Fröllje of the ICBM - the two main authors of the study - extracted tiny teeth and other skeletal debris of fossil fish from the sediment to analyse their content of isotopes of the rare earth metal neodymium.

"Neodymium is particularly useful for identifying water masses of different origin," said Pahnke, the head of the Max Planck Research Group for Marine Isotope Geochemistry based at the ICBM and the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology in Bremen, explaining that each layer of water has its own characteristic neodymium signature. The isotope ratios of this element vary depending on which ocean basin the water comes from. For instance, the coldest and therefore deepest water mass in the Southern Pacific forms on the continental shelf of Antarctica and carries a distinct neodymium signature. Overlying this mass is a layer that combines water from the North Atlantic, the South Pacific and the North Pacific and hence is marked by a different signature.

View from RV Polarstern while collecting sediment samples used in the study by Basak et al.
[Credit: Dr. Katharina Pahnke]

Using fish debris in deep-sea sediments, the researchers were able to trace the variations in neodymium concentrations at different depths over the course of time. The result: at the peak of the last ice age approximately 20,000 years ago, the neodymium signature of samples taken from depths below 4,000 metres was significantly lower than at lower depths. "The only explanation for such a pronounced difference is that there was no mixing of the water masses at that time," said Fröllje, who currently works at the University of Bremen. He and his colleagues concluded from this that the deep waters were strongly stratified during the glacial period.

As the climate in the southern hemisphere grew warmer towards the end of the last ice age around 18,000 years ago, the stratification of the water masses was broken up and neodymium values at different depths converged. "There was probably more mixing because the density of the water decreased as a result of the warming," Pahnke explained. This then led to the release of the carbon dioxide stored in deep waters.

For some time now climate researchers have been speculating on why fluctuations in atmospheric CO2 levels followed the same pattern as temperature in the southern hemisphere whereas the temperature in the north at times ran counter to these fluctuations. One theory is that certain processes in the Southern Ocean played an important role.

"With our analyses we have for the first time provided concrete evidence supporting the theory that there is a connection between the CO2 fluctuations and stratification in the Southern Ocean," said co-author of the study Dr. Frank Lamy of the AWI in Bremerhaven. The current study supports the hypothesis that the warming of the southern hemisphere broke up stable stratification in the Antarctic Ocean, resulting in the release of the carbon dioxide that was stored in these waters.

Source: Alfred Wegener Institute [February 22, 2018]

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Rapid evolution of a calcareous microalgae

When simulating future environmental conditions researchers face a problem: laboratory experiments are easy to control and to reproduce, but are insufficient to mimic the complexity of natural ecosystems. In contrast, experiments under real conditions in nature are much more complicated and difficult to control. Scientist of the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel have combined both approaches to investigate the response of a major plankton species to increasing ocean acidification.

Emiliania huxleyi cells in an electron microscopic picture
[Credit: Lennart Bach, GEOMAR]

The concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere increases continuously. As a consequence, an increasing amount of CO2 dissolves in the ocean, where it reacts to carbonic acid and acidifies the seawater. As ocean acidification progresses steadily, scientists aim to assess the implications of this process for marine ecosystems.

A team of researchers from the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel has for the first time examined the adaptability of the calcified alga Emiliania huxleyi to ocean acidification in a combination of laboratory and field experiments. "Some of the algae lineages in the experiment showed an extremely rapid change in their ecological fitness. We did not expect that to happen," says lead author Dr. Lennart Bach from GEOMAR. The study has been published recently in the international journal Nature Ecology and Evolution.

The current experiments were preceded by years of laboratory tests with Emiliania huxleyi at the GEOMAR in Kiel. Dr. Kai Lohbeck, co-author of the new study, had been keeping the algae under increased CO2 concentrations. Three years later, it became apparent that Emiliania huxleyi coped better with acidification than at the beginning of the experiment. "For us, that was a clear indication for the adaptability of the algae. But the experiment took place under laboratory conditions. Therefore, the question remained whether the evolutionary adaptation during an isolated lab experiment would bring an advantage also under natural conditions," says Lohbeck.

The opportunity to investigate this question emerged in the spring of 2013. The research group of Professor Ulf Riebesell conducted experiments with the Kiel Offshore Mesocosms in the framework of the collaborative project BIOACID (Biological Effects of Ocean Acidification) on the influence of ocean acidification on natural communities in Gullmarsfjord in Sweden. From the laboratory in Kiel, some of the already adapted algae cultures as well as the associated control groups were taken along to Sweden. There, they were added to the plankton communities which were acclimated to high CO2 levels in the field experiments.

"To our surprise, we found that the algae lineages that had already been adapted to ocean acidification in the lab did not cope any better at lower pH levels than the control groups that had never experienced acidification before," says Dr. Bach. An equally surprising finding: Although all algal lineages had the same ancestors, they differed significantly in their ability to compete in the natural plankton community after only three years. While some lineages proliferated rapidly, others tended to be excluded from the natural community, regardless of whether or not they were previously adapted to ocean acidification. "This demonstrates Emiliania huxleyi's ability to evolve rapidly," Bach resumes the results of the study.

Prof. Riebesell, co-author of the study and coordinator of the BIOACID project, sees this as an indication of how little we understand the long-term effects of ocean acidification: "The organisms' ability to adapt to new environmental conditions surprises us again and again. However, it does not change the fact that as ocean acidification progresses, many species will be unable to maintain their ecological niches. The loss of biodiversity is therefore inevitable."

Source: Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel (GEOMAR) [February 14, 2018]

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Twenty-five years of satellite data confirm rising sea levels

Global sea level rise is not cruising along at a steady 3 mm per year, it's accelerating a little every year, like a driver merging onto a highway, according to a powerful new assessment led by CIRES Fellow Steve Nerem. He and his colleagues harnessed 25 years of satellite data to calculate that the rate is increasing by about 0.08 mm/year every year -- which could mean an annual rate of sea level rise of 10 mm/year, or even more, by 2100.

A family of sea-level-measuring satellites [Credit: NASA]

"This acceleration, driven mainly by accelerated melting in Greenland and Antarctica, has the potential to double the total sea level rise by 2100 as compared to projections that assume a constant rate -- to more than 60 cm instead of about 30." said Nerem, who is also a professor of Aerospace Engineering Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder. "And this is almost certainly a conservative estimate," he added. "Our extrapolation assumes that sea level continues to change in the future as it has over the last 25 years. Given the large changes we are seeing in the ice sheets today, that's not likely."

If the oceans continue to change at this pace, sea level will rise 65cm (26 inches) by 2100 -- enough to cause significant problems for coastal cities, according to the new assessment by Nerem and several colleagues from CU Boulder, the University of South Florida, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Old Dominion University, and the National Center for Atmospheric Research. The team, driven to understand and better predict Earth's response to a warming world, published their work in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Rising concentrations of greenhouse gases in Earth's atmosphere increase the temperature of air and water, which causes sea level to rise in two ways. First, warmer water expands, and this "thermal expansion" of the oceans has contributed about half of the 7 cm of global mean sea level rise we've seen over the last 25 years, Nerem said. Second, melting land ice flows into the ocean, also increasing sea level across the globe.

The satellite record (blue line) was adjusted first to remove the effects of the 1991 Pinatubo eruption (red line)
and then to remove the influence of El Niño and La Niña (green line) [Credit: Nerem et al./PNAS]

These increases were measured using satellite altimeter measurements since 1992, including the U.S./European TOPEX/Poseidon, Jason-1, Jason-2, and Jason-3 satellite missions. But detecting acceleration is challenging, even in such a long record. Episodes like volcanic eruptions can create variability: the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991 decreased global mean sea level just before the Topex/Poseidon satellite launch, for example. In addition, global sea level can fluctuate due to climate patterns such as El Niños and La Niñas (the opposing phases of the El Niño Southern Oscillation, or ENSO) which influence ocean temperature and global precipitation patterns.

So Nerem and his team used climate models to account for the volcanic effects and other datasets to determine the ENSO effects, ultimately uncovering the underlying sea-level rate and acceleration over the last quarter century. They also used data from the GRACE satellite gravity mission to determine that the acceleration is largely being driven by melting ice in Greenland and Antarctica.

The team also used tide gauge data to assess potential errors in the altimeter estimate. "The tide gauge measurements are essential for determining the uncertainty in the GMSL (global mean sea level) acceleration estimate," said co-author Gary Mitchum, USF College of Marine Science. "They provide the only assessments of the satellite instruments from the ground." Others have used tide gauge data to measure GMSL acceleration, but scientists have struggled to pull out other important details from tide-gauge data, such as changes in the last couple of decades due to more active ice sheet melt.

"This study highlights the important role that can be played by satellite records in validating climate model projections," said co-author John Fasullo, a climate scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research. "It also demonstrates the importance of climate models in interpreting satellite records, such as in our work where they allow us to estimate the background effects of the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo on global sea level."

Although this research is impactful, the authors consider their findings to be just a first step. The 25-year record is just long enough to provide an initial detection of acceleration -- the results will become more robust as the Jason-3 and subsequent altimetry satellites lengthen the time series.

Ultimately, the research is important because it provides a data-driven assessment of how sea level has been changing, and this assessment largely agrees with projections using independent methods. Future research will focus on refining the results in this study with longer time series, and extending the results to regional sea level, so they can better predict what will happen in your backyard.

Source: University of Colorado at Boulder [February 13, 2018]

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