Revision paper

Ocean Acidification: Concerns Are Increasing as the pH is Decreasing

Abstract:

(insert acidification after completely done with paper)

Introduction:

Making 75% of the world’s entire mass with 5% explored to this day, the oceans are undeniably immense. The intimidating size and nature of the oceans makes them appear impervious to variance, having changed very little in the last few million years. Even when there are major terrestrial changes occurring on the globe (mass extinctions, the movement of land formations, and global glacial ages)12, the makeup of the seas remain remarkably stable. However the rising levels of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of the planet have caused the ocean’s pH to decrease as much of the elevated carbon dioxide amount is being dissolved into the ocean. The changed acidity has been disastrous for many different species in the ocean; organisms from crustaceans, corals, juvenile fish, and nematodes have experienced negative effects of the acidification. The ocean represents many complexes system between the aquatic flora and fauna and thus many species have suffered indirectly through the destruction of related organisms. Ocean acidification is a process that is not new and not very well understood because of these complexities; research methods and expertise in this topic still remain disputed.

What is Ocean Acidification?

Ocean acidification occurs as the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere undergoes gas exchange and dissolves into the ocean. When this carbon dioxide dissolves into the ocean it becomes carbonic acid (H2 CO3) and will dissociate into hydrogen ions; as the concentration of the hydrogen ions increases, the pH decreases, and the water becomes less alkaline12. Within the last 50 years there has been a change from 8.2 to 8.08, which may seem insignificant, but when considering the overall ability of the ocean to resist any kind of change in acidity, it is raising concerns from scientists on a global scale1. It is particularly troubling because of the effect it has on coral reefs, diatoms, zooplankton, and microcrustaceans, which make up the base of aquatic food systems.

Acidification on a Global Scale and the Effects of Changing Ocean Chemistry

Acidification can be seen to have effects all over the globe but there are some areas that are harder hit than others. Because of how much more negatively smaller vertbrates and invertbrates seems to be affected by the acidification, areas where ecosystem are built off of these creatures are particularly hard hit. The tropical ecosystems along the equator are suffering inparticular because the reef and shallow water ecosystems in this area are particularly dependent on the creatures like crustaceans, corals, juvenile fish, and nematodes. Additionally there has been much research devoted to the severe impacts of ocean acidification in California currents because of the marine shellfish that will decimated because of rising aragonite levels. The discovery of the rising level of acidity in the oceans is relatively new so there are still uncertainties on the effects of the acidification on the globe completely. One in particular is changes in the ocean’s movement. Increased warming suggest that the ocean will be more stable with less upwelling, which would mean that there would be reduced ability of the ocean to get rid of the added carbon dioxide. However, to offset this change in the solubility pump, there has been increased activity in biological pumps because of increased temperature13.

(talk about where acidification affects the environment the most)

Current Acidification Research Approaches and Areas

(the major players in the field

Failing Ocean Acidification Models

One area in particular that is being debated in the field of ocean acidification is the legitimacy of the measurements and research techniques. One of the most cited papers on ocean acidification is a survey on seawater chemistry by marine scientist Christopher Cornwall, who studies ocean acidification at the University of Western Australia in Crawley, and ecologist Catriona Hurd of the University of Tasmania in Hobart, Australia. This paper has been cited thousands of times but the methods have been recorded as inappropriate or taken incorrectly. Their research showed that the change in the acidification of the oceans has contributed to worsening the strength of organisms that rely on carbon calcium for protection (coral, crustaceans, and zooplankton); these results have been replicated in other studies, but what remains is that there is a fundamental problem with taking individual experiments and applying them to overall prediction in the ecosystem as a whole. This represents a major obstacle to any improvements that can be made towards solving the problem of ocean acidification. There is overwhelming data to show that ocean acidification if destroying key stone species and critical ecosystems, but the difficulty in replication and analysis of this data means that the conclusions cannot always be magnified to create positive change. This relates to many similar problems in the study versus the application of overall climate change policy and science, but because ocean acidification is so new as a topic there is less resources to legitimize what kinds of research is being done. This debate can be resolved

Impacts of Ocean Acidification on Coral Reef Ecosystems

The topic of ocean acidification is most relevant in relation to its effect on coral bleaching because of the many bleaching events that have occurred recently. When researching ocean acidification it is most likely associated with coral bleaching, however it is still highly debated how ocean acidification actually leads to the death of the corals. Some research has shown that the increased acidity decreases the coral’s ability to develop their calcium carbonate spicules which contributes to their bleaching and loss of zooxanthelle; where there remains a debate is whether the coral dies immediately after the bleaching, struggles and eventually dies, or is able to regain after these large bleaching events. The future of research in the effects of acidification on coral bleaching needs to be directed to understand the future of the corals that are bleached. Because the bleaching is already so extensive, the most proactive research will be the most critical in finding a solution.

Other Invertebrates

Fundamental changes in the ocean’s chemistry includes effects on the nitrogen cycling in marine systems 13. Many marine plants, like types of algae and other fauna, depend on nitrogen cycling and the subsequent cascading nutrient production; additionally these plants form the basis of many food webs for higher order organisms. Changes in chemistry also harm the calcification processes of many types of plankton and other vertebrate animals9. There has been as large of an effect on vertebrate populations because of their larger size and ability to handle change in pH. Most significantly it has been shown that fish larvae have not been able to form eggs to survive in, in highly acidic water 8. Because this is also a recent discovery we submit that the consequences of the dying fish will not have more significant results until the fish would have been mature. There will be missing amounts of fish that have the potential to have catastrophic results on ecosystems and economies all over the world.

Future Applications

Conclusion

References:

1. Schooner, Jerald. "Ocean Acidification." Environmental Science and Technology 47 (2013): n. pag. American Chemical Society. Web. 1 Aug. 2016.

2. Cressey, Daniel. "Crucial Ocean-acidification Models Come up Short." Nature524.7563 (2015): 18-19. Web. 1 Aug. 2016.

3. Munday, Philip. "Faculty of 1000 Evaluation for Projecting Coral Reef Futures under Global Warming and Ocean Acidification." F1000 - Post-publication Peer Review of the Biomedical Literature (n.d.): n. pag. Web. 1 Aug. 2016

4. Houlbre`que, Fanny. "Ocean Acidification Reduces Feeding Rates in the Scleractinian Coral Stylophora Pistillata." LIMNOLOGY 60 (n.d.): 89-99. Association for the Sciences of Limnology and Oceanography, 2015. Web. 1 Aug. 2016

5. Munday, Philip. "Faculty of 1000 Evaluation for Projecting Coral Reef Futures under Global Warming and Ocean Acidification." F1000 - Post-publication Peer Review of the Biomedical Literature (n.d.): n. pag. Web.

6. Roberts, David A., Silvana N. R. Birchenough, Ceri Lewis, Matthew B. Sanders, Thi Bolam, and Dave Sheahan. "Ocean Acidification Increases the Toxicity of Contaminated Sediments." Glob Change Biol Global Change Biology19.2 (2012): 340-51. Web.

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8. Reyes-Nivia, Catalina, Guillermo Diaz-Pulido, David Kline, Ove-Hoegh Guldberg, and Sophie Dove. "Ocean Acidification and Warming Scenarios Increase Microbioerosion of Coral Skeletons." Glob Change Biol Global Change Biology 19.6 (2013): 1919-929. Web.

9. Clarkson, M. O., S. A. Kasemann, R. A. Wood, T. M. Lenton, S. J. Daines, S. Richoz, F. Ohnemueller, A. Meixner, S. W. Poulton, and E. T. Tipper. "Ocean Acidification and the Permo-Triassic Mass Extinction." Science348.6231 (2015): 229-32. Web.

10. Edmunds, Peter J., Darren Brown, and Vincent Moriarty. "Interactive Effects of Ocean Acidification and Temperature on Two Scleractinian Corals from Moorea, French Polynesia." Glob Change Biol Global Change Biology 18.7 (2012): 2173-183. Web.

11. Vogel, Nikolas. "Calcareous Green Alga Halimeda Tolerates Ocean Acidification Conditions at Tropical Carbon Dioxide Seeps - Vogel - 2015 - Limnology and Oceanography - Wiley Online Library." Calcareous Green Alga Halimeda Tolerates Ocean Acidification Conditions at Tropical Carbon Dioxide Seeps - Vogel - 2015 - Limnology and Oceanography - Wiley Online Library. N.p., 15 Jan. 2015. Web. 01 Aug. 2016.

12. "Climate Change: The Science of Global Warming and Our Energy Future."Choice Reviews Online 47.01 (2009): n. pag. Web.

13. Gattuso, Jean-Pierre, and Lina Hansson. Ocean Acidification. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2011. Print.