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Distribution and Trends of Coccolithophore Concentration in the Oceans using Satellite-derived Particulate Inorganic Carbon
  • Sudeep Das,
  • Sourav Sil
Sudeep Das
Indian Institute of Technology Bhubaneswar

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Sourav Sil
Indian Institute of Technology Bhubaneswar
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Abstract

Particulate inorganic carbon (PIC) indicates CaCO3, which is produced biologically and constitutes about a quarter of total marine sediments. It is produced by coral reefs, foraminifera, coccolithophores and some macrophytic algae (Balch et al., 2005). The dominating calcifiers in the oceans are the coccolithophores, producing roughly half of the global ocean carbonates. They also cover 20 % of the blooming phytoplankton (Krumhardt et al., 2017). An algorithm has been developed to estimate the PIC concentrations from satellites. The data is collected by MODIS Aqua and SeaWiFS. Observational studies show mixed results for coccolithophore abundance as both increase/decrease in various places. However, it can be agreed that anthropogenic climate change has a significant impact on the PIC, mainly due to global warming and ocean acidification.