INSTITUTE OF BASIC SCIENCE
CREDIT: INSTITUTE OF BASIC SCIENCE
Global warming is directly affecting ocean net primary production (NPP) at the bottom of the food web as well as seasonal bloom times, according to a new study published in the journal Nature. plankton. Nature Climate change.
Contrary to the well-understood situation on land, where climate change is expected to prolong the average plant growth period due to CO2 fertilization effect and earlier thaw of spring snow at high latitudes, the seasonal response of plankton in the ocean remains a mystery.
To address this open research question, a team of climate scientists from the IBS Center for Climate Physics (ICCP) at Pusan National University in South Korea, Princeton University, and University of California Los Angeles and the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL), in the US, analyzed a global warming supercomputer model conducted with an actual Earth system model. To better separate the anthropogenic effect on plankton seasonality over the next ~80 years from the chaotic variations occurring in nature, the team ran the model 30 times with concentrations of greenhouse gas concentrations are increasing and the initial conditions are slightly different.
Analysis of this so-called large population simulation reveals that global warming will have a significant effect on future plankton bloom times and that these changes will become detectable. present in the context of natural variations, reaching dissimilar conditions by the end of 21st century. In such cases, there may be a timing mismatch of the life cycles of the phytoplankton and the zooplankton that feed on them, affecting the entire seasonal rhythm of the marine food web. The paper indicates that such impacts could be particularly severe for the high-latitude productive regions of the Northern Hemisphere.
The underlying controls for future changes in time in marine phytoplankton productivity largely stem from the close association between the growth and decline of ocean primary producers. Ocean and zooplankton act as carnivores. Seasonal variations in ambient factors such as temperature, light levels and nutrient concentrations (referred to as “bottom-up” control) and predator numbers (from the bottom up). top down) cause phytoplankton to thrive and decline; Predator populations in turn respond rapidly to the abundance of phytoplankton. The authors found that planetary warming could disrupt this delicate combination of external environmental factors and zooplankton responses, leading to seasonal variations in blooms. abundance of phytoplankton. Dr. Karl J. Stein, co-author of the study, said: “The additional level of predator/prey interaction makes the ocean response more complex than the terrestrial plant response, where control is primarily bottom-up”.
“Our study demonstrates the power of large synthetic computer model simulations to understand how ecosystems respond to future climate change, in this case their seasonality. After establishing the timing and underlying mechanism of future changes in plankton bloom, we will further address whether such changes will have a negative impact on food security in the future. future or not,” said Dr. Ryohei Yamaguchi from the IBS Center for Climate Physics and lead author of the study.
JOURNEYS
Natural climate change
DOI
RESEARCH METHODS
Synthetic analysis
RESEARCH SUBJECTS
Do not apply
ARTICLE TITLE
Nutrient delamination drives future changes in phytoplankton blooms
ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE
May 9, 2022
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