Synchronous response of marine plankton ecosystems to climate in the Northeast Atlantic and the North Sea

International audience Over the last few decades, global warming has accelerated both the rate and magnitude of changes observed in many functional units of the Earth System. In this context, plankton are sentinel organisms because they are sensitive to subtle levels of changes in temperature and mi...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of Marine Systems
Main Authors: Goberville, Eric, Beaugrand, Gregory, Edwards, Martin
Other Authors: Laboratoire d’Océanologie et de Géosciences (LOG) - UMR 8187 (LOG), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université du Littoral Côte d'Opale (ULCO)-Université de Lille-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: HAL CCSD 2014
Subjects:
[SDU.STU.OC]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Oceanography
North Atlantic
North Atlantic oscillation
Northeast Atlantic
Online Access:https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01009824
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmarsys.2013.05.008
Description
Summary:International audience Over the last few decades, global warming has accelerated both the rate and magnitude of changes observed in many functional units of the Earth System. In this context, plankton are sentinel organisms because they are sensitive to subtle levels of changes in temperature and might help in identifying the current effects of climate change on pelagic ecosystems. In this paper, we performed a comparative approach in two regions of the North Atlantic (i.e. the Northeast Atlantic and the North Sea) to explore the relationships between changes in marine plankton, the regional physico-chemical environment and large-scale hydro-climatic forcing using four key indices: the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO), the East Atlantic (EA) pattern and Northern Hemisphere Temperature (NHT) anomalies. Our analyses suggest that long-term changes in the states of the two ecosystems were synchronous and correlated to the same large-scale hydro-climatic variables: NHT anomalies, the AMO and to a lesser extent the EA pattern. No significant correlation was found between long-term ecosystem modifications and the state of the NAO. Our results suggest that the effect of climate on these ecosystems has mainly occurred in both regions through the modulation of the thermal regime

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