Climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming
We investigate the ways in which marine biologically mediated heating increases the surface atmospheric temperature. While the effects of phytoplankton light absorption on the ocean have gained attention over the past years, the impact of this biogeophysical mechanism on the atmosphere is still uncl...
Published in: | Biogeosciences |
---|---|
Main Authors: | , , , |
Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
Language: | unknown |
Published: |
2022
|
Subjects: | |
Online Access: | https://oro.open.ac.uk/81866/ https://oro.open.ac.uk/81866/1/81866VOR.pdf https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-223-2022 |
id |
ftopenunivgb:oai:oro.open.ac.uk:81866 |
---|---|
record_format |
openpolar |
spelling |
ftopenunivgb:oai:oro.open.ac.uk:81866 2023-06-11T04:16:35+02:00 Climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming Asselot, Rémy Lunkeit, Frank Holden, Philip B. Hense, Inga 2022-01-14 application/pdf https://oro.open.ac.uk/81866/ https://oro.open.ac.uk/81866/1/81866VOR.pdf https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-223-2022 unknown https://oro.open.ac.uk/81866/1/81866VOR.pdf Asselot, Rémy; Lunkeit, Frank; Holden, Philip B. <http://oro.open.ac.uk/view/person/pbh56.html> and Hense, Inga (2022). Climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming. Biogeosciences, 19(1) pp. 223–239. Journal Item Public PeerReviewed 2022 ftopenunivgb https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-223-2022 2023-05-28T06:07:00Z We investigate the ways in which marine biologically mediated heating increases the surface atmospheric temperature. While the effects of phytoplankton light absorption on the ocean have gained attention over the past years, the impact of this biogeophysical mechanism on the atmosphere is still unclear. Phytoplankton light absorption warms the surface of the ocean, which in turn affects the air–sea heat and CO 2 exchanges. However, the contribution of air–sea heat versus CO 2 fluxes in the phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming has not been yet determined. Different so-called climate pathways are involved. We distinguish heat exchange, CO 2 exchange, dissolved CO 2 , solubility of CO 2 and sea-ice-covered area. To shed more light on this subject, we employ the EcoGEnIE Earth system model that includes a new light penetration scheme and isolate the effects of individual fluxes. Our results indicate that phytoplankton-induced changes in air–sea CO 2 exchange warm the atmosphere by 0.71 ∘ C due to higher greenhouse gas concentrations. The phytoplankton-induced changes in air–sea heat exchange cool the atmosphere by 0.02 ∘ C due to a larger amount of outgoing longwave radiation. Overall, the enhanced air–sea CO 2 exchange due to phytoplankton light absorption is the main driver in the biologically induced atmospheric heating. Article in Journal/Newspaper Sea ice The Open University: Open Research Online (ORO) Biogeosciences 19 1 223 239 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
The Open University: Open Research Online (ORO) |
op_collection_id |
ftopenunivgb |
language |
unknown |
description |
We investigate the ways in which marine biologically mediated heating increases the surface atmospheric temperature. While the effects of phytoplankton light absorption on the ocean have gained attention over the past years, the impact of this biogeophysical mechanism on the atmosphere is still unclear. Phytoplankton light absorption warms the surface of the ocean, which in turn affects the air–sea heat and CO 2 exchanges. However, the contribution of air–sea heat versus CO 2 fluxes in the phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming has not been yet determined. Different so-called climate pathways are involved. We distinguish heat exchange, CO 2 exchange, dissolved CO 2 , solubility of CO 2 and sea-ice-covered area. To shed more light on this subject, we employ the EcoGEnIE Earth system model that includes a new light penetration scheme and isolate the effects of individual fluxes. Our results indicate that phytoplankton-induced changes in air–sea CO 2 exchange warm the atmosphere by 0.71 ∘ C due to higher greenhouse gas concentrations. The phytoplankton-induced changes in air–sea heat exchange cool the atmosphere by 0.02 ∘ C due to a larger amount of outgoing longwave radiation. Overall, the enhanced air–sea CO 2 exchange due to phytoplankton light absorption is the main driver in the biologically induced atmospheric heating. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Asselot, Rémy Lunkeit, Frank Holden, Philip B. Hense, Inga |
spellingShingle |
Asselot, Rémy Lunkeit, Frank Holden, Philip B. Hense, Inga Climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming |
author_facet |
Asselot, Rémy Lunkeit, Frank Holden, Philip B. Hense, Inga |
author_sort |
Asselot, Rémy |
title |
Climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming |
title_short |
Climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming |
title_full |
Climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming |
title_fullStr |
Climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming |
title_full_unstemmed |
Climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming |
title_sort |
climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming |
publishDate |
2022 |
url |
https://oro.open.ac.uk/81866/ https://oro.open.ac.uk/81866/1/81866VOR.pdf https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-223-2022 |
genre |
Sea ice |
genre_facet |
Sea ice |
op_relation |
https://oro.open.ac.uk/81866/1/81866VOR.pdf Asselot, Rémy; Lunkeit, Frank; Holden, Philip B. <http://oro.open.ac.uk/view/person/pbh56.html> and Hense, Inga (2022). Climate pathways behind phytoplankton-induced atmospheric warming. Biogeosciences, 19(1) pp. 223–239. |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-223-2022 |
container_title |
Biogeosciences |
container_volume |
19 |
container_issue |
1 |
container_start_page |
223 |
op_container_end_page |
239 |
_version_ |
1768374985965961216 |