The Coral Reef pH-stat: An Important Defense Against Ocean Acidification? (Invited)
Abstract
Concerns have been raised on how coral reefs will be affected by ocean acidification (OA), but there are currently no direct predictions on how seawater CO2 chemistry and pH within coral reefs might change in response to OA. Projections of future changes in seawater pH and aragonite saturation state have only been applied to open ocean conditions surrounding coral reef environments rather than the reef systems themselves. The seawater CO2 chemistry within heterogenous coral reef systems can be significantly different from that of the open ocean depending on the residence time, community composition and the major biogeochemical processes occurring on the reef, i.e., net ecosystem organic carbon production and calcification, which combined act to modify the seawater chemistry. We argue that these processes and coral reefs in general could as a pH-stat, partly regulating seawater pH on the reef and offsetting changes in seawater chemistry imposed by ocean acidification. Based on observations from the Bermuda coral reef, we show that a range of anticipated biogeochemical responses of coral reef communities to OA by the end of this century could partially offset changes in seawater pH by an average of 12% to 24%.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2013
- Bibcode:
- 2013AGUFMOS54A..01A
- Keywords:
-
- 4805 OCEANOGRAPHY: BIOLOGICAL AND CHEMICAL Biogeochemical cycles;
- processes;
- and modeling;
- 4220 OCEANOGRAPHY: GENERAL Coral reef systems;
- 4806 OCEANOGRAPHY: BIOLOGICAL AND CHEMICAL Carbon cycling;
- 1635 GLOBAL CHANGE Oceans