Towards an improved organic carbon budget for the western Barents Sea shelf

There is generally a lack of knowledge on how marine organic carbon accumulation is linked to vertical export and primary productivity patterns in the Arctic Ocean. Despite the fact that annual primary production in the Arctic has increased as a consequence of shrinking sea ice, its effect on flux,...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Climate of the Past
Main Authors: I. Pathirana, J. Knies, M. Felix, U. Mann
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Copernicus Publications 2014
Subjects:
Environmental pollution
TD172-193.5
Environmental protection
TD169-171.8
Environmental sciences
GE1-350
Arctic
Arctic Ocean
Svalbard
Barents Sea
Sea ice
ice covered areas
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-10-569-2014
https://doaj.org/article/0086105cba2d4d679e23ab8532cea7ed
Description
Summary:There is generally a lack of knowledge on how marine organic carbon accumulation is linked to vertical export and primary productivity patterns in the Arctic Ocean. Despite the fact that annual primary production in the Arctic has increased as a consequence of shrinking sea ice, its effect on flux, preservation, and accumulation of organic carbon is still not well understood. In this study, a multi-proxy geochemical and organic-sedimentological approach is coupled with organic facies modelling, focusing on regional calculations of carbon cycling and carbon burial on the western Barents Shelf between northern Scandinavia and Svalbard. OF-Mod 3-D, an organic facies modelling software tool, is used to reconstruct and quantify the marine and terrestrial organic carbon fractions and to make inferences about marine primary productivity changes across the marginal ice zone (MIZ). By calibrating the model against an extensive set of sediment surface samples, we improve the Holocene organic carbon budget for ice-free and seasonally ice-covered areas in the western Barents Sea. The results show that higher organic carbon accumulation rates in the MIZ are best explained by enhanced surface water productivity compared to ice-free regions, implying that shrinking sea ice may reveal a significant effect on the overall organic carbon storage capacity of the western Barents Sea shelf.

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