What is it about?
Ocean plants require more than just sunlight and carbon dioxide to grow. Trace metals like iron and manganese are essential nutrients that are sometimes in scarce supply in open ocean ecosystems. Through the International GEOTRACES program (www.geotraces.org), we are trying to understand how these "micro" nutrients are delivered to the ocean. Here, we review early results on how coastal oceans can provide these trace metals to the open ocean environment.
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Why is it important?
Our findings show that trace element inputs to the ocean from continental shelves are often well in excess of other known sources like dust input. This has important implications for ocean productivity, which in turn helps regulate our climate through uptake of CO2 from the atmosphere.
Perspectives
This paper was the result of discussions held at a workshop outside of London in December 2015. It was made possible only through extensive international cooperation that is one of the hallmarks of the GEOTRACES program.
Matt Charette
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Coastal ocean and shelf-sea biogeochemical cycling of trace elements and isotopes: lessons learned from GEOTRACES, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A Mathematical Physical and Engineering Sciences, October 2016, Royal Society Publishing,
DOI: 10.1098/rsta.2016.0076.
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