Measurements of formation, degradation, and sinking velocity of diatom aggregates from laboratory studies performed at 15 °C and 4 °C

DOI

Most deep ocean carbon flux profiles show low and almost constant fluxes of particulate organic carbon (POC) in the deep ocean. However, the reason for the non-changing POC fluxes at depths is unknown. This study presents direct measurements of formation, degradation, and sinking velocity of diatom aggregates from laboratory studies performed at 15 °C and 4 °C during a three-week experiment. The average carbon-specific respiration rate during the experiment was 0.12 ± 0.03 at 15 °C, and decreased 3.5-fold when the temperature was lowered to 4 °C. No direct influence of temperature on aggregate sinking speed was observed. Using the remineralisation rate measured at 4 °C and an average particle sinking speed of 150 m d**-1, calculated carbon fluxes were similar to those collected in deep ocean sediment traps from a global data set, indicating that temperature plays a major role for deep ocean fluxes of POC.

Supplement to: Iversen, Morten Hvitfeldt; Ploug, Helle (2013): Temperature effects on carbon-specific respiration rate and sinking velocity of diatom aggregates - potential implications for deep ocean export processes. Biogeosciences, 10(6), 4073-4085

Identifier
DOI https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.828266
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-10-4073-2013
Metadata Access https://ws.pangaea.de/oai/provider?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=datacite4&identifier=oai:pangaea.de:doi:10.1594/PANGAEA.828266
Provenance
Creator Iversen, Morten Hvitfeldt ORCID logo; Ploug, Helle (ORCID: 0000-0002-8989-245X)
Publisher PANGAEA
Publication Year 2013
Rights Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
OpenAccess true
Representation
Language English
Resource Type Supplementary Publication Series of Datasets; Collection
Format application/zip
Size 5 datasets
Discipline Earth System Research
Spatial Coverage (2.000 LON, 55.000 LAT)