Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jul 9, 2026

Measuring Carbon-based Contaminant Mineralization Using Combined CO2 Flux and Radiocarbon Analyses
Published on: October 21, 2016
Foraminiferal calcification response to glacial-interglacial changes in atmospheric CO2
Stephen Barker1, Henry Elderfield
1Department of Earth Sciences, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EQ, UK. sbar98@esc.cam.ac.uk
Abstract:
A record of foraminiferal shell weight across glacial-interglacial Termination I shows a response related to seawater carbonate ion concentration and allows reconstruction of a record of carbon dioxide in surface seawater that matches the atmospheric record. The results support suggestions that higher atmospheric carbon dioxide directly affects marine calcification, an effect that may be of global importance to past and future changes in atmospheric CO2. The process provides negative feedback to the influence of marine calcification on atmospheric carbon dioxide and is of practical importance to the application of paleoceanographic proxies.
Related Concept Videos
Chemical Reactions
Chemical Reactions Rearrange Atoms into New Substances
A chemical reaction takes starting materials—the reactants—and changes them into different...
Redox Reactions
The Carbon Cycle
Acids, Bases and Neutralization Reactions
Chemical Reactions
The relative amounts of reactants and products represented in a balanced chemical equation are often referred to as stoichiometric amounts. However, in...
Acids, Bases and Neutralization Reactions

