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"Published Online September 22 2011 Science 28 October 2011: Vol. 334 no. 6055 pp. 505-509 DOI: 10.1126/science.1206583 Report Increasing N Abundance in the Northwestern Pacific Ocean Due to Atmospheric Nitrogen Deposition Tae-Wook Kim1, Kitack Lee1,*, Raymond G. Najjar2, Hee-Dong Jeong3, Hae Jin Jeong4 + Author Affiliations 1School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Pohang University of Science and Technology, Pohang, 790−784, Korea. 2Department of Meteorology, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA. 3East Sea Fisheries Research Institute, National Fisheries Research and Development Institute, Gangneung, 210-861, Korea. 4School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Seoul National University, Seoul, 151−747, Korea. ↵*To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: ktl@postech.ac.kr Abstract The relative abundance of nitrate (N) over phosphorus (P) has increased over the period since 1980 in the marginal seas bordering the northwestern Pacific Ocean, located downstream of the populated and industrialized Asian continent. The increase in N availability within the study area was mainly driven by increasing N concentrations and was most likely due to deposition of pollutant nitrogen from atmospheric sources. Atmospheric nitrogen deposition had a high temporal correlation with N availability in the study area (r = 0.74 to 0.88), except in selected areas wherein riverine nitrogen load may be of equal importance. The increase in N availability caused by atmospheric deposition and riverine input has switched extensive parts of the study area from being N-limited to P-limited. "

"USC researcher experiments with changing ocean chemistry Jan. 19, 2011 | Molly Peterson | KPCC In his lab, USC's Dave Hutchins is simulating possible future atmospheres and temperatures for the Earth. He says he's trying to figure out how tiny organisms that form the base of the food web will react to a more carbon-intense ocean. Burning fossil fuels doesn't just put more carbon into the atmosphere and help warm the climate. It's also changing the chemistry of sea water. KPCC's Molly Peterson visits a University of Southern California researcher who studies the consequences of a more corrosive ocean. Tailpipes and refineries and smokestacks as far as the eye can see in Los Angeles symbolize the way people change the planet's climate. They remind Dave Hutchins that the ocean's changing too. Hutchins teaches marine biology at USC. He says about a third of all the carbon, or CO2, that people have pushed into earth's atmosphere ends up in sea water - "which is a good thing for us because if the ocean hadn't taken up that CO2 the greenhouse effect would be far more advanced than it is." He smiles. Hutchins says that carbon is probably not so good for the ocean. "The more carbon dioxide that enters the ocean the more acidic the ocean gets." On the pH scale, smaller numbers represent more acidity. The Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute estimates we've pumped 500 million tons of carbon into the world's oceans. Dave Hutchins at USC says that carbon has already lowered the pH value for sea water. "By the end of this century we are going to have increased the amount of acid in the ocean by maybe 200 percent over natural pre-industrial levels," he says. "So we are driving the chemistry of the ocean into new territory - into areas that it has never seen." Hutchins is one of dozens of scientists who study the ripples of that new chemistry into the marine ecosystem. Now for an aside. I make bubbly water at home with a soda machine, and to do that, I pump ca

How is global temperature regulated? An experimental representation - Simple experiments to help pupils understand how different parameters regulate temperature at the Earth's surface. Interaction at the Air-Water Interface, part 1 - A very simple experiment to demonstrate gas exchange and equilibration at the boundary layer between air and water. Pupils will also observe acidification of water due to CO2 introduced directly in the water. Interaction at the Air-Water Interface, part 2 - A second set of experiment to demonstrate gas exchange and equilibration at the boundary layer between air and water. Pupils observe a high atmospheric CO2 concentration will produce water acidification. Uptake of Carbon Dioxide from the Water by Plants - The following experiments will demonstrate the role of plants in mitigating the acidification caused when CO2 is dissolved in water. Carbon Dioxide Fertilization of Marine Microalgae (Dunalliela sp.) Cultures: Marine microalgae in different atmospheric CO2 concentration - An experiment designed to illustrate the impact of carbon dioxide on microalgal growth in the aquatic environment. Introduction to the principles of climate modelling - Working with real data in spreadsheets to create a climate model, students discover the global carbon budget and make their own predictions for the next century. Global carbon budget between 1958 and 2007 - Working with real global carbon budget data, students produce graphs to find the best representation of the data to make predictions about human CO2 emissions for the next century. This activity is also a nice application of percentages. Estimation of natural carbon sinks - Working with real global carbon budget data, students estimate how much of the CO2 emitted into the atmosphere as a result of human activities is absorbed naturally each year. How does temperature affect the solubility of CO2 en the water? - The following experiments will explore effects of water temperature on sol

Abstract Changes in the upwelling and degassing of carbon from the Southern Ocean form one of the leading hypotheses for the cause of glacial-interglacial changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide. We present a 25,000-year-long Southern Ocean radiocarbon record reconstructed from deep-sea corals, which shows radiocarbon-depleted waters during the glacial period and through the early deglaciation. This depletion and associated deep stratification disappeared by ~14.6 ka (thousand years ago), consistent with the transfer of carbon from the deep ocean to the surface ocean and atmosphere via a Southern Ocean ventilation event. Given this evidence for carbon exchange in the Southern Ocean, we show that existing deep-ocean radiocarbon records from the glacial period are sufficiently depleted to explain the ~190 per mil drop in atmospheric radiocarbon between ~17 and 14.5 ka.

"Science 25 November 2011: Vol. 334 no. 6059 pp. 1052-1053 DOI: 10.1126/science.334.6059.1052 * News Focus Adaptation to Climate Change Adaptation to Climate Change Time to Adapt to a Warming World, But Where's the Science? 1. Richard A. Kerr With dangerous global warming seemingly inevitable, users of climate information-from water utilities to international aid workers-are turning to climate scientists for guidance. But usable knowledge is in short supply. Figure View larger version: * In this page * In a new window Adapt to that. Climate will change, but decision-makers want to know how, where, and when. "CREDIT: KOOS VAN DER LENDE/NEWSCOM" DENVER, COLORADO-The people who brought us the bad news about climate change are making an effort to help us figure out what to do about it. As climate scientists have shown, continuing to spew greenhouse gases into the atmosphere will surely bring sweeping changes to the world-changes that humans will find it difficult or impossible to adapt to. But beyond general warnings, there is another sort of vital climate research to be done, speakers told 1800 attendees at a meeting here last month. And so far, they warned, researchers have delivered precious little of the essential new science. At the meeting, subtitled "Climate Research in Service to Society,"* the new buzzword was "actionable": actionable science, actionable information, actionable knowledge. "There's an urgent need for actionable climate information based on sound science," said Ghassem Asrar, director of the World Climate Research Programme, the meeting's organizer based in Geneva, Switzerland. What's needed is not simply data but processed information that an engineer sizing a storm-water pipe to serve for the next 50 years or a farmer in Uganda considering irrigating his fields can use to make better decisions in a warming world. Researchers preparing for the next international climate assessment, due in 2013, delive

Aerosols Altered Asian Monsoons Summer monsoons provide much of the water for farming on the Indian subcontinent, but the pattern of rain shifted dramatically during the last half of the 20th century. In a study appearing online 29 September in Science, researchers pin the blame on soot and other aerosols from human activities. From 1951 to 1999, central-northern India became drier while Pakistan, northwestern India, and southern India got wetter. To determine whether these changes were due to natural variability or human interference (greenhouse gases or aerosols), climate scientists Massimo Bollasina, Yi Ming, and V. Ramaswamy of the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory/NOAA in Princeton, New Jersey, compared the history of rainfall with simulations that singled out each climate "forcing" factor to observe its impact. Although greenhouse gases would have increased rainfall over north-central India, the aerosols, they found, caused the "very pronounced drying trend," Ming says. Here's why: Under normal conditions, the northern hemisphere receives more energy from the sun from June to September; that imbalance drives the ocean-atmosphere circulation that powers the monsoons. But atmospheric aerosols shaded the northern hemisphere relative to the southern hemisphere, altering the energy balance between the two-weakening the circulation and altering where the rain falls.

Discovering what happens to the huge amounts of carbon - an estimated 2 megatons a year off the Oregon coast alone - is critical to understanding the interface between the atmosphere and the open ocean that influences marine dead zones, atmospheric pollution and ultimately climate change.

Carbon dioxide (CO2) emitted to the atmosphere by human activities is being absorbed by the oceans, making them more acidic (lowering the pH the measure of acidity).

Ocean Probes To Help Refine Climate Change Forecasting; 'Oceanography Is Risky; You Lose Things' by Underwatertimes.com News Service - August 5, 2011 17:43 EST LOS ANGELES, California -- A USC researcher has opened a new window to understanding how the ocean impacts climate change. Lisa Collins, environmental studies lecturer with the USC Dornsife College, spent four years collecting samples from floating sediment traps in the San Pedro Basin off the Los Angeles coast, giving scientists a peek at how much carbon is locked up in the ocean and where it comes from. Collins' research suggests that the majority of particulate organic carbon (POC) falling to the basin floor is marine-derived, not the result of runoff from rainfall. This means that the ocean off the coast of Southern California is acting as a carbon "sink" - taking carbon out of the atmosphere via phytoplankton and locking it up in sediment. Though estimates regarding the effect of carbon in the ocean already exist, her hard data can help climatologists create more accurate predictions of how carbon will impact global warming. What is unique about Collins' study is that it is not just a snapshot of POC falling, but rather a finely detailed record of four years of POC production, showing how much fell and when. "It's all tied to climate change," said Collins, who started the research as a graduate student working for USC Earth Sciences Professor Will Berelson. "This lets us see patterns. "Our data can help climate modelers better predict the interactions between the oceans and atmosphere with respect to carbon which can help them better predict how much carbon dioxide will end up sequestered over the long term as sediments in the ocean," she said. Collins' study is among the longest of its kind in the region. A similar study was conducted in Santa Monica Basin from 1985-1991, and another is currently underway in Hawaii. Her findings appear in the August issue of Deep-Sea Research I. Between Janua

Global warming…the Earth is steadily getting warmer. The why is it getting warmer question will solicit so many theories that it would drive one mad to sort through them all. Global warming itself is sort of a misnomer; it is a symptom of the problem, not the cause. The cause for all the debate is whether or not the atmospheric increase of CO2 gas over the last two-hundred years has affected the Earth's climate. Recently scientists have discovered another reason to be concerned about the increasing level of atmospheric CO2. It is startling that the media and science has hardly touched upon ocean acidification. It would not be surprising if you have never heard this term. A LexisNexis search of the news wire services found in the past week there were 348 articles that mentioned global warming. Three articles contained ocean acidification. In the last 2 years, a LexisNexis search of all sources found a mere 216 articles that mentioned ocean acidification. That is a worldwide search of newspapers, magazines and wire services. The New York Times did not mention it a single time, but they ran so many Global Warming articles that there were too many matches for the page to display.

A major puzzle of paleoclimatology is why, after a long interval of cooling climate, each late Quaternary ice age ended with a relatively short warming leg called a termination. We here offer a comprehensive hypothesis of how Earth emerged from the last global ice age. A prerequisite was the growth of very large Northern Hemisphere ice sheets, whose subsequent collapse created stadial conditions that disrupted global patterns of ocean and atmospheric circulation. The Southern Hemisphere westerlies shifted poleward during each northern stadial, producing pulses of ocean upwelling and warming that together accounted for much of the termination in the Southern Ocean and Antarctica. Rising atmospheric CO2 during southern upwelling pulses augmented warming during the last termination in both polar hemispheres.

Dr. Charles Miller Research Interests * Atmospheric Chemistry and Photochemistry * Molecular Spectroscopy * Carbon Cycle Science * Free Radical Structure/Reactivity Relationships

"As the amount of Carbon Dioxide continues to build up in the atmosphere it is also changing the chemistry of the ocean. Ocean surveys and modeling studies have revealed that the pH of the ocean is decreasing (which means the ocean is becoming more acidic) due to increasing concentrations of carbon dioxide. This changing oceanic environment will have severe implications for life in the ocean. COSEE NOW is pleased to present A plague in air and sea: Neutralizing the acid of progress a new audio slideshow that features Debora Inglesias-Rodriguez. In this scientist profile, Dr. Inglesias-Rodriguez, a Biological Oceanographer at the University of Southampton National Oceanography Centre, shares her story of how she grew up loving the ocean and became interested in science. She also explains how witnessing the effects of climate change has lead her to research how organisms like Sea Urchins are being affected by ocean acidification."

NARRATOR: Even though the ocean covers seventy percent of the Earth's surface, people tend to know more information about land than the sea. As a result, our understanding of the ocean is often incomplete or full of misconceptions. How well do you know the ocean? You may think Earth has five separate oceans. They're clearly labeled on our maps. But, in actuality, these are all connected, and part of one global ocean system. Ever wonder why the ocean is blue? You may have heard its because the water reflects the color of the sky. Not quite. Sunlight contains all the colors of the rainbow. When it hits the ocean, it gets scattered by the water molecules. Blue light is scattered the most, which is why the ocean appears blue. Even more interesting is that floating plants and sediments in the water can cause light to bounce in such a way for the ocean to appear green, yellow, and even red! Another idea some people have is that the sea floor is flat. Actually, just like land, the sea floor has canyons, plains, and mountain ranges. And many of these features are even bigger than those found on land. You may also think that our ocean's saltwater is just a mix of water and table salt. Not so. Seawater's "salt" is actually made of dissolved minerals from surface runoff. That is, excess water from rain and melting snow flowing over land and into the sea. This is why the ocean doesn't have the same level of salinity everywhere. Salinity varies by location and season. Finally, you may have heard that melting sea ice will cause sea levels to rise. In reality, sea ice is just frozen seawater, and because it routinely freezes and melts, its volume is already accounted for in the ocean. Sea levels can rise, however, from ice that melts off land and into the ocean. Understanding basic facts about the ocean is important since it affects everything from our atmosphere to our ecosystems. By knowing your ocean, you are better prepared to help protect it.

"Recognising ocean acidification in deep time: An evaluation of the evidence for acidification across the Triassic-Jurassic boundary Sarah E. GreeneCorresponding author contact information, 1, E-mail the corresponding author, Rowan C. Martindale1, E-mail the corresponding author, Kathleen A. Ritterbush E-mail the corresponding author, David J. Bottjer E-mail the corresponding author, Frank A. Corsetti E-mail the corresponding author, William M. Berelson E-mail the corresponding author Department of Earth Sciences, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA 90089 Received 22 July 2011. Accepted 17 March 2012. Available online 5 April 2012. While demonstrating ocean acidification in the modern is relatively straightforward (measure increase in atmospheric CO2 and corresponding ocean chemistry change), identifying palaeo-ocean acidification is problematic. The crux of this problem is that the rock record is a constructive archive while ocean acidification is essentially a destructive (and/or inhibitory) phenomenon. This is exacerbated in deep time without the benefit of a deep ocean record. Here, we discuss the feasibility of, and potential criteria for, identifying an acidification event in deep time. Furthermore, we investigate the evidence for ocean acidification during the Triassic-Jurassic (T-J) boundary interval, an excellent test case because 1) it occurs in deep time, beyond the reach of deep sea drilling coverage; 2) a potential trigger for acidification is known; and 3) it is associated with one of the 'Big Five' mass extinctions which disproportionately affected modern-style invertebrates. Three main criteria suggest that acidification may have occurred across the T-J transition. 1) The eruption of the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province (CAMP) and the associated massive and rapid release of CO2 coincident with the end-Triassic mass extinction provide a suitable trigger for an acidification event (

"Friday, December 14th, 2007 Coral in Crisis Bleached corals on coral reef on southern Great Barrier Reef in January 2002. Coral bleaching primarily affects reef building corals when conditions get too warm. Image © Science The world's coral reefs are in great danger, threatened by climate change and rising carbon dioxide levels. In an article published in the journal Science, researchers provide provide three different scenarios for the fate of reef-building corals worldwide as they face higher concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide and the related ocean acidification that slows coral calcification, the process needed for a reef to grow. Increasing CO2 levels have the potential to greatly shift the chemistry of ocean waters, threatening the existence of most coral species. "