1. deepseanews
  2. Experiments in ocean acidification

Experiments in ocean acidification

By petnoyer on August 27, 2007.

i-cbb3625bfd643aa7b71806272a3f8397-coccolith copy.jpgIncreased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere leads to more dissolved CO2 in the world's oceans. In turn this will increase the hydrogen ion concentration in seawater, and lower pH from pre-industrial levels (8.179) to present day levels (8.104) in a process known as "ocean acidification". Note that even projected pH levels of 7.824 in 2050 are still above neutral. Regardless, many scientists are concerned that calcifying marine organisms like corals, mollusks, echinoderms and coccolithophores will be vulnerable to dissolution under the projected 'less alkaline' regime.

A new study published in Geochemistry, Geophysics, and Geosystems (G Cubed) by French researchers Luc Beaufort, Ian Probert, and Noelle Bouchet uses a new method to estimate the effect of dissolution on calcium carbonate plates (coccoliths) secreted by Emiliana huxleyi coccolithophores. E. huxleyi is a cosmopolitan single celled algae responsible for a good deal of global primary production. The researchers conducted two acidification experiments, using cultured and fossil coccoliths.The results indicate that acidification does not change significantly the weight and size of coccoliths.

Link to the abstract is here.

Tags
Uncategorized
Categories
Physical Sciences

More like this

Climate Change - what's worse than the heat?
**A post about Climate Change as a part of Blog Action Day 2009**When people talk about climate change, they, more often than not, talk about global warming. Yes, the effects of increased temperature will be diverse and generally bad for most creatures on Earth, including us. But the most dramatic…
Will climate change have negative effects on deep-sea corals?
a special guest post by John Guinotte, Marine Conservation Biology Institute The answer is uncertain as very few manipulative experiments have been conducted to test how deep-sea corals react to changes in temperature, seawater chemistry (pH), water motion (currents), and food availability. It is…
Will ocean acidification affect deep-water corals?
The global ocean has already taken up half of the atmospheric carbon dioxide produced by humans over the last 200 years, so the ongoing effects of climate change are dampened. That's right, you can thank the ocean for saving the planet so far. Without the ocean, what we would have? A place that…
Ocean Acidification and the bleaching of Spongebob Squarepants
So basically things aren't looking too good for Spongebob Squarepants and his buddies. The reason being that, all of this carbon dioxide we're pumping into the air is doing some serious shit to the oceans. However in this case, it's less to do with the usual greenhouse effects, but more to do…