Seasonal and interannual variations in atmospheric oxygen and implications for the global carbon cycle
Abstract
Measurements of changes in atmospheric molecular oxygen using a new interferometric technique show that the O2 content of air varies seasonally in both the Northern and Southern Hemisphere and is decreasing from year to year. The seasonal variations provide a new basis for estimating global rates of biological organic carbon production in the ocean, and the interannual decrease constrains estimates of the rate of anthropogenic CO2 uptake by the oceans.
- Publication:
-
Nature
- Pub Date:
- August 1992
- DOI:
- 10.1038/358723a0
- Bibcode:
- 1992Natur.358..723K
- Keywords:
-
- Annual Variations;
- Atmospheric Chemistry;
- Atmospheric Composition;
- Carbon Cycle;
- Oxygen;
- Abundance;
- Interferometry;
- Reaction Kinetics;
- Geophysics