17 Facts About Carbon pump

Budget calculations of the biological carbon pump are based on the ratio between sedimentation and remineralization .

The biological pump is a set of processes that transfer organic carbon from the surface to the deep ocean, is at the heart of the ocean carbon cycle.

Biological pump depends on the fraction of primary produced organic matter that survives degradation in the euphotic zone and that is exported from surface water to the ocean interior, where it is mineralized to inorganic carbon, with the result that carbon is transported against the gradient of dissolved inorganic carbon from the surface to the deep ocean.

Biological pump can be divided into three distinct phases, the first of which is the production of fixed carbon by planktonic phototrophs in the euphotic surface region of the ocean.

Biological pump is responsible for transforming dissolved inorganic carbon into organic biomass and pumping it in particulate or dissolved form into the deep ocean.

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Biological Carbon pump is accompanied by a physico-chemical counterpart known as the solubility Carbon pump.

Solubility Carbon pump is driven by the coincidence of two processes in the ocean:.

Carbonate pump is sometimes referred to as the “hard tissue” component of the biological pump.

Continental shelf pump is proposed as operating in the shallow waters of the continental shelves as a mechanism transporting carbon from the continental waters to the interior of the adjacent deep ocean.

Biological carbon pump is one of the chief determinants of the vertical distribution of carbon in the oceans and therefore of the surface partial pressure of CO2 governing air-sea CO2 exchange.

Budget calculations of the biological carbon pump are based on the ratio between sedimentation and remineralization .

Carbon pump dioxide is one of the principal drivers of global change and has been identified as one of the major challenges in the 21st century.

Carbon pump dioxide generated during anthropogenic activities such as deforestation and burning of fossil fuels for energy generation rapidly dissolves in the surface ocean and lowers seawater pH, while CO2 remaining in the atmosphere increases global temperatures and leads to increased ocean thermal stratification.

Modelling studies by Buesseler and Boyd revealed that the overall transfer efficiency of the biological Carbon pump is determined by a combination of factors: seasonality; the composition of phytoplankton species; the fragmentation of particles by zooplankton; and the solubilization of particles by microbes.

Carbon sequestration via the lipid pump is therefore decoupled from nutrient removal, allowing carbon uptake by oceanic primary production to continue.

Biological Carbon pump is thought to have played significant roles in atmospheric CO2 fluctuations during past glacial-interglacial periods.

Monitoring the biological pump is critical to understanding how the Earth's carbon cycle is changing.