Planktic Foraminiferal Sedimentation and Calcite Budget
Abstract
Vertical flux and sedimentation rate of planktic foraminiferal tests is quantified on a global scale. The planktic foraminiferal test flux is a consequence of the population dynamics, and the differential settling modes for different species are a precondition for the differences in the regional flux rates. The average planktic foraminiferal calcite flux rate at the 100-m depth-level is estimated at 50% of the global-marine calcite flux and 6% of the total carbon flux. The most significant decrease in the planktic foraminiferal test flux rates between 100-700 m water depth possibly results from increased bacterially-mediated decomposition of cytoplasm and a decreasing pH in microenvironments within foraminiferal tests. Throughout most of the year, on average only 1-3% of the initially exported CaCO3 reaches the deep sea floor. Pulsed flux events, mass dumps of fast settling particles, yield a major contribution of tests to the formation of deep-sea sediments. On a global average, ~25% of the total calcite produced by planktic foraminifers arrives in the deep ocean and at the sediment surface. To complete the open-marine, particulate CaCO3 inventory, the contribution of coccolithophores, pteropods, and calcareous dinophytes is discussed. The global planktic foraminiferal calcite flux rate at 100 m depth amounts to 23-56% of the total open marine CaCO3 flux. The total planktic foraminiferal contribution of CaCO3 to global surface sediments is estimated at 0.36-0.88 Gt per year, ~30-80% of the total deep-marine calcite budget.
- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2002
- Bibcode:
- 2002AGUFMOS21B0193S
- Keywords:
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- 3022 Marine sediments: processes and transport;
- 3030 Micropaleontology;
- 4805 Biogeochemical cycles (1615);
- 4855 Plankton;
- 4863 Sedimentation