Award Abstract # 1755574
The Annual Cycle of the Biological Carbon Pump in the Subpolar North Atlantic

NSF Org: OCE
Division Of Ocean Sciences
Recipient: WELLESLEY COLLEGE
Initial Amendment Date: February 26, 2018
Latest Amendment Date: February 26, 2018
Award Number: 1755574
Award Instrument: Standard Grant
Program Manager: Henrietta Edmonds
hedmonds@nsf.gov
 (703)292-7427
OCE
 Division Of Ocean Sciences
GEO
 Directorate for Geosciences
Start Date: March 1, 2018
End Date: September 30, 2019 (Estimated)
Total Intended Award Amount: $116,857.00
Total Awarded Amount to Date: $116,857.00
Funds Obligated to Date: FY 2018 = $13,842.00
History of Investigator:
  • Hilary Palevsky (Principal Investigator)
    palevsky@bc.edu
Recipient Sponsored Research Office: Wellesley College
106 CENTRAL ST
WELLESLEY HILLS
MA  US  02481-8203
(781)283-2079
Sponsor Congressional District: 05
Primary Place of Performance: Wellesley College
MA  US  02481-8204
Primary Place of Performance
Congressional District:
05
Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): Z17DSLNJ1DX1
Parent UEI:
NSF Program(s): Chemical Oceanography
Primary Program Source: 01001819DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
Program Reference Code(s): 1389, 7398
Program Element Code(s): 167000
Award Agency Code: 4900
Fund Agency Code: 4900
Assistance Listing Number(s): 47.050

ABSTRACT

Ocean biology plays an important role in the Earth's carbon cycle. While most of the organic material produced by phytoplankton in the sunlit surface waters of the oceans is eaten and recycled in the surface waters, a small amount sinks to the deep ocean in what is called the "biological carbon pump." The biological pump is particularly hard to study in high latitude regions, which can be difficult to get to and challenging to work in. It is also particularly important to understand the biological pump in these parts of the ocean, where much of the world's deep ocean waters are formed. The export of carbon to deep waters can be estimated by carefully measuring the amount of excess oxygen left behind in surface waters. Oxygen in seawater can be measured very precisely using sensors deployed on moorings, floats, and gliders. These sensors can be deployed for years at a time, but their measurements must be carefully calibrated. In this project, investigators would use carefully calibrated oxygen sensors on gliders to, in turn, calibrate the oxygen sensors on a set of moorings in the high latitude North Atlantic Ocean, to study the biological carbon pump over a period of two years. The project would train several undergraduate students and a graduate student, and result in the development of educational laboratory materials that incorporate glider and mooring data from the project.

The goal of this proposal is to observationally constrain the annual magnitude and seasonal timing of the biological carbon pump (determined as annual net community production; ANCP) and its influence on air-sea carbon dioxide flux by using biogeochemical sensor measurements from the Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) Irminger Sea Array. However, existing OOI oxygen sensor calibration suffers from both pre- and post-deployment drift, currently precluding the ability to calculate ANCP by oxygen mass balance. The investigators therefore propose to improve the accuracy and utility of OOI Irminger Sea oxygen measurements by deploying two gliders configured for air calibration of their oxygen sensors when surfacing between profiles. These air-calibrated gliders will be used to intercalibrate all 12 existing oxygen sensors on the Irminger Sea Array and produce a calibrated oxygen product incorporating data from all sensors, which will ensure sufficient accuracy to calculate ANCP. Both the annual magnitude and seasonal timing of ANCP, including upper ocean biological productivity and thermocline respiration, will be determined using an oxygen mass balance approach within a data- constrained 1D physical model. A suite of 1D model simulations including the inorganic carbon system, gas exchange, and ANCP determined from oxygen mass balance will be used, together with OOI carbon dioxide measurements, to diagnose influences of physical and biological drivers of air-sea carbon dioxide flux, improving both quantitative and mechanistic understanding of how the biological pump influences the carbon cycle.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

PUBLICATIONS PRODUCED AS A RESULT OF THIS RESEARCH

Note:  When clicking on a Digital Object Identifier (DOI) number, you will be taken to an external site maintained by the publisher. Some full text articles may not yet be available without a charge during the embargo (administrative interval).

Some links on this page may take you to non-federal websites. Their policies may differ from this site.

Palevsky, Hilary and Nicholson, David "The North Atlantic Biological Pump: Insights from the Ocean Observatories Initiative Irminger Sea Array" Oceanography , v.31 , 2018 https://doi.org/10.5670/oceanog.2018.108 Citation Details

Please report errors in award information by writing to: awardsearch@nsf.gov.

Print this page

Back to Top of page