Seawater carbonate chemistry and phytoplankton primary production, and its trophic transfer to zooplankton in a subtropical eutrophic water (Wuyuan Bay, China)

• Main Authors: Wang, Tifeng, Jin, Peng, Wells, Mark L, Trick, Charles G, Gao, Kunshan
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: PANGAEA 2019
• Subjects: Alkalinity; total; Aragonite saturation state; Behaviour; Bicarbonate ion; Biomass/Abundance/Elemental composition; Calcite saturation state; Calculated using CO2SYS; Calculated using seacarb after Nisumaa et al. (2010); Carbon; inorganic; dissolved; Carbonate ion; Carbonate system computation flag; Carbon dioxide; Chlorophyll a; Coast and continental shelf; Community composition and diversity; Consumption; Containers and aquaria (20-1000 L or < 1 m**2); Docosahexaenoic acid per chlorophyll a; Eicosapentaenoic acid per chlorophyll a; Entire community; EXP; Experiment; Experiment duration; Fatty acid; per dry mass; standard deviation; Fatty acid composition; Field experiment; Fugacity of carbon dioxide (water) at sea surface temperature (wet air); Grazing rate; Growth/Morphology; Growth rate; Monounsaturated fatty acids per chlorophyll a; Name; Net primary production of carbon per chlorophyll a; Nitrate; Nitrite; North Pacific; OA-ICC; Ocean acidification
• Online Access: https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.908297; https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.908297

Ocean acidification (OA) has potential to affect marine phytoplankton in ways that are partly understood, but there is less knowledge about how it may alter the coupling to secondary producers. We investigated the effects of OA on phytoplankton primary production, and its trophic transfer to zooplankton in a subtropical eutrophic water (Wuyuan Bay, China) under present day (400 μatm) and projected end-of-century (1000 μatm) pCO2 levels. Net primary production was unaffected, although OA did lead to small decreases in growth rates. OA had no measurable effect on micro-/mesozooplankton grazing rates. Elevated pCO2 had no effect on phytoplankton fatty acid (FA) concentrations during exponential phase, but saturated FAs increased relative to the control during declining phase. FA profiles of mesozooplankton were unaffected. Our findings show that short-term exposure of plankton communities in eutrophic subtropical waters to projected end-of-century OA conditions has little effect on primary productivity and trophic linkage to mesozooplankton.