Oceanic Acid Trip

The oceans absorb a good amount of our carbon emissions. It helps lessen the effects of man-made climate change. But there is a downside: the effect of all that carbon on the chemistry of the sea. And scientists are learning more about one of the primary effects: ocean acidification.

As the CO2 dissolves, the concentration of the hydrogen ion in the seawater increases, making it more acidic. Not surprisingly, the oceans are significantly more acidic today than they were before the Industrial Revolution. That spells trouble for some sea creatures -- mainly those that make shells, like molluscs, crustaceans and corals.

Now, according to a recent article in Scientific American, marine scientist Andrew Moy from the Antarctic Climate & Ecosystems Cooperative Research Center (ACE) in Hobart, Tasmania, has uncovered more proof that climate change is negatively affecting these shell-builders.

Moy and his team compared two groups of shells from the tiny creatures (less than 1 mm) known as Foraminifera. Both groups of shells were from ocean cores collected along the South Tasman Rise, a part of the seafloor about 340 miles (550 km) from Hobart. One group was taken from cores collected in 1995 while the other group was from cores taken between 1997 and 2004. The cores provide a fossil and geological record dating back 50,000 years.

They found that because of the ocean's higher acidity, the Foraminifera cannot build their shells as big as they used to. How that impacts this species and the larger food chain is still unknown. But one thing is certain: These tiny animals are not able to store as much carbon in their smaller shells as they used to, and that's not a good sign for the continued storage of carbon in the ocean at large.

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photo (Globigerina bulloides is pictured in the middle): Ernst Haeckel (1904). Kunstformen der Natur. Leipzig und Wien: Bibliographisches Institut