Numerical cell model investigating cellular carbon fluxes in Emiliania huxleyi

Coccolithophores play a crucial role in the marine carbon cycle and thus it is interesting to know how they will respond to climate change. After several decades of research the interplay between intracellular processes and the marine carbonate system is still not well understood. On the basis of experimental findings given in literature, a numerical cell model is developed that describes inorganic carbon fluxes between seawater and the intracellular sites of calcite precipitation and photosynthetic carbon fixation. The implemented cell model consists of four compartments, for each of which the carbonate system is resolved individually. The four compartments are connected to each other via H(+), CO2, and HCO3(-) fluxes across the compartment-confining membranes. For CO2 accumulation around RubisCO, an energy-efficient carbon concentrating mechanism is proposed that relies on diffusive CO2 uptake. At low external CO2 concentrations and high light intensities, CO2 diffusion does not suffice to cover the carbon demand of photosynthesis and an additional uptake of external HCO3(-) becomes essential. The model is constrained by data of Emiliania huxleyi, the numerically most abundant coccolithophore species in the present-day ocean.