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Earth system models suggest that anthropogenic climate change will influence marine phytoplankton over the coming century with light-limited regions becoming more productive and nutrient-limited regions less productive. Anthropogenic climate change can influence not only the mean state but also the internal variability around the mean state, yet little is known about how internal variability in marine phytoplankton will change with time. Here, we quantify the influence of anthropogenic climate change on internal variability in marine phytoplankton biomass from 1920 to 2100 using the Community Earth System Model 1 Large Ensemble (CESM1-LE). We find a significant decrease in the internal variability of global phytoplankton carbon biomass under a high emission (RCP8.5) scenario and heterogeneous regional trends. Decreasing internal variability in biomass is most apparent in the subpolar North Atlantic and North Pacific. In these high-latitude regions, bottom-up controls (e.g., nutrient supply, temperature) influence changes in biomass internal variability. In the biogeochemically critical regions of the Southern Ocean and the equatorial Pacific, bottom-up controls (e.g., light, nutrients) and top-down controls (e.g., grazer biomass) affect changes in phytoplankton carbon internal variability, respectively. Our results suggest that climate mitigation and adaptation efforts that account for marine phytoplankton changes (e.g., fisheries, marine carbon cycling) should also consider changes in phytoplankton internal variability driven by anthropogenic warming, particularly on regional scales.
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Internal climate variability modulates decadal changes in ocean anthropogenic carbon storage
Abstract The ocean removes man-made (anthropogenic) carbon from the atmosphere and thereby mitigates climate change. Observations from global hydrographic surveys reveal the spatial and temporal evolution of the ocean inventory of anthropogenic carbon and suggest substantial decadal variability in historical storage rates. Here, we use a 100-member ensemble of an Earth system model to investigate the influence of external forcing and internal climate variability on historical changes in ocean anthropogenic carbon storage over 1994 to 2014. Our findings reveal that the externally forced, decadal changes in storage are largest in the Atlantic (2–4 mmol m−3decade−1) and positive nearly everywhere. Internal climate variability modulates regional ocean anthropogenic carbon storage trends by up to 10 mmol m−3decade−1. The influence of internal climate variability on decadal storage changes is most prominent at depths of ∼300 m and at the edges of the subtropical gyres. Internal variability in anthropogenic carbon in the extratropics has high spectral power on decadal to multi-decadal timescales, indicating that the approximately decadal repetitions of hydrographic surveys may produce storage change estimates that are heavily influenced by internal climate variability.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1948664
- PAR ID:
- 10565581
- Publisher / Repository:
- IOP Publishing
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Environmental Research Letters
- Volume:
- 20
- Issue:
- 1
- ISSN:
- 1748-9326
- Format(s):
- Medium: X Size: Article No. 014070
- Size(s):
- Article No. 014070
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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