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Updated: Apr 29, 2026

Chemotactic Response of Marine Micro-Organisms to Micro-Scale Nutrient Layers
Published on: May 28, 2007
Enhanced role of eddies in the Arctic marine biological pump
Eiji Watanabe1, Jonaotaro Onodera1, Naomi Harada2
11] Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, 3173-25 Showa-machi, Kanazawa-ku, Yokohama, Kanagawa 236-0001, Japan [2].
Abstract:
The future conditions of Arctic sea ice and marine ecosystems are of interest not only to climate scientists, but also to economic and governmental bodies. However, the lack of widespread, year-long biogeochemical observations remains an obstacle to understanding the complicated variability of the Arctic marine biological pump. Here we show an early winter maximum of sinking biogenic flux in the western Arctic Ocean and illustrate the importance of shelf-break eddies to biological pumping from wide shelves to adjacent deep basins using a combination of year-long mooring observations and three-dimensional numerical modelling. The sinking flux trapped in the present study included considerable fresh organic material with soft tissues and was an order of magnitude larger than previous estimates. We predict that further reductions in sea ice will promote the entry of Pacific-origin biological species into the Arctic basin and accelerate biogeochemical cycles connecting the Arctic and subarctic oceans.
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