A new study illuminates how the diatoms flourish – and illuminate – the southern ocean

It appears that an area of the long southern ocean that has long connected to the peripheral colors by reflecting large amounts of turquoise colored light is full of chilica -rich compounds, according to a new study. Surprisingly, there is also evidence in this polar water of coconthhofavar, a type of marine algae with detailed calcium carbonate that plays an important role in the global carbon cycle.

The study helps in answering a long -term puzzle of satellite ocean sciences about what microbes dominated in this part of the ocean, which has been largely impossible to reach, which illuminates how the plankton community turns in response to changing the temperature of the sea and chemistry. This, in turn, has important effects on carbon cycling in the southern ocean and remote sensing tools that scientists use to study.

“This work takes a wide brush to understand the biological and chemical dynamics of this remote water body in ways that were not possible before,” said the lead author of the study, Barne Bal Bass, who is the chief research scientist at the Beglo Ocean Laboratory Laboratory.

The study was published this week in the magazine Global Biochemical Courses.

In the early first decade of the twentieth century, Balch and his colleagues identified a group of sea water that surrounds Antarctica, which has become known as the Great Calcate belt. This area is unusually high in irreplaceable carbon, such as calcium carbonate and limestone, which reflects light again to satellites. Scientists ultimately emphasized that this is due to the shiny calcium carbonate shells of vast flowers of cocolithophone.

At the same time, though, they identified a good space south of the Calcate belt, which also looked unusually bright in satellite images, although the water was very cold for cocoithphone. This puzzle was more difficult to clarify with heavy cloud cover, icebergs, and harsh seas, making it difficult to monitor this south in the far south with ships or satellites. yet.

The researchers sailed on board R/V Roger Reville From Hawaii, to 60 degrees, with a short realization of the east to monitor the place where the water from the south appears to many swirls. Along the clip, the team measured the ocean color; Calcification and light representation rates; Inorganic carbon concentrations and silica, which are minerals that reflect light, which is crucial to help with organic carbon insulation in the deep ocean.

“Industrial satellites see only several meters of the ocean, but we were able to move with multiple measurements at multiple depths,” Bass said. “We did not have a full set of integrated measurements through the water column in this part of the ocean.”

The multi-level approach-the classification of chemical bioga measurements, visual data, and even visual charges of microscopic microbes-have enabled scientists to monitor how the plankton community turns to the south: from the total belts, and finally, in the total belt, and finally, colica-wanders in the coin. The polar front.

This mixture of supplementary methods provides a “smoking rifle”, that high levels of reflection scientists have noticed it in satellite images south of the Calcite belt that can be explained by the Guard. These silica-based structures that are built by diatoms, which resemble microscopic pill boxes, reflect light in the same way as cocolithfor shells (more crafts takes to produce the same visual effect as cocoithophone, though-testimony to the intensity of their concentration).

Surprisingly, though, the team also noticed small invisible carbon concentrations, and some quantity of calcification occurs – the first optical guide on cocoithophies in the maximum southern waters. This indicates that cocolithphor can live in cold water from what was expected. He said that the swirls coming from the south to work as “groups of seeds”, which provides a small but fixed stream of cocoithophies in the Great Calcate belt.

The presence of cocoithophies can affect a wider geographical range than expected on how carbon moves across the southern ocean, which is one of the most important pink basins of carbon in the atmosphere. Meanwhile, the domination of diatoms south of the polar front highlights the need to improve the algorithms that scientists use to translate satellite data into meaningful predictions of the ocean biology. This means that combining the measurements of other satellite variables to help distinguish between diatoms and coconthhofavra in satellite images.

“We are expanding our point of view from the place where cocolithphor lives and finally began to understand the patterns we see in satellite images of this part of the ocean that we rarely go to.” “There is nothing like measuring a multi -way to tell a more complete story.”

In addition to Balch, the multidisciplinary team includes researchers at the BGLOOW DARIPEAU Laboratory, Bruce Bowler, Sunny Pinkham, as well as scientists from the Woods Hall Institute of Ocean Sciences, Arizona State University, Texas A &M University, and the Bermuda Ocean Science Institute.