Around one third of current Arctic Ocean primary production sustained by rivers and coastal erosion

• Published in: Nature Communications
• Main Authors: Terhaar, Jens, Lauerwald, Ronny, Regnier, Pierre, Gruber, Nicolas, Bopp, Laurent
• Other Authors: Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement Gif-sur-Yvette (LSCE), Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université Paris-Saclay-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Direction de Recherche Fondamentale (CEA) (DRF (CEA)), Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA)-Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA), Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB), Universität Bern = University of Bern = Université de Berne (UNIBE), Ecologie fonctionnelle et écotoxicologie des agroécosystèmes (ECOSYS), AgroParisTech-Université Paris-Saclay-Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement (INRAE), Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule - Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zürich (ETH Zürich), Laboratoire de Météorologie Dynamique (UMR 8539) (LMD), Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-École polytechnique (X), Institut Polytechnique de Paris (IP Paris)-Institut Polytechnique de Paris (IP Paris)-École des Ponts ParisTech (ENPC)-Sorbonne Université (SU)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Département des Géosciences - ENS Paris, École normale supérieure - Paris (ENS-PSL), Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-École normale supérieure - Paris (ENS-PSL), Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL), French National Research Agency (ANR) ANR-18-ERC2-0001-01, European Commission, MTES/FRB Acidoscope project, ENS-Chanel research chair, ANR-18-ERC2-0001,CONVINCE,Contraindre la réponse de la biogéochimie marine au changement climatique(2018), European Project: 643052,H2020,H2020-MSCA-ITN-2014,C-CASCADES(2015), European Project: 641816,H2020,H2020-SC5-2014-two-stage,CRESCENDO(2015), European Project: 776810,H2020,H2020-SC5-2017-OneStageB,VERIFY(2018)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2021
• Subjects: [SDV]Life Sciences [q-bio]; Arctic; Arctic Ocean
• Online Access: https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-03201601; https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-03201601/document; https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-03201601/file/s41467-020-20470-z.pdf; https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-20470-z

International audience Net primary production (NPP) is the foundation of the oceans' ecosystems and the fisheries they support. In the Arctic Ocean, NPP is controlled by a complex interplay of light and nutrients supplied by upwelling as well as lateral inflows from adjacent oceans and land. But so far, the role of the input from land by rivers and coastal erosion has not been given much attention. Here, by upscaling observations from the six largest rivers and using measured coastal erosion rates, we construct a pan-Arctic, spatio-temporally resolved estimate of the land input of carbon and nutrients to the Arctic Ocean. Using an ocean-biogeochemical model, we estimate that this input fuels 28-51% of the current annual Arctic Ocean NPP. This strong enhancement of NPP is a consequence of efficient recycling of the land-derived nutrients on the vast Arctic shelves. Our results thus suggest that nutrient input from the land is a key process that will affect the future evolution of Arctic Ocean NPP.