Analysis of remineralisation, lability, temperature sensitivity and structural composition of organic matter from the upper ocean

Abstract

Organic carbon (OC) synthesised by plankton is exported out of the surface layer as particulate (POC) and dissolved (DOC) organic carbon. This “biological pump” constitutes a major pathway in the global marine carbon cycle, each year exporting about 10PgC into the ocean interior, where it is subsequently remineralised via biological decomposition. Remineralised inorganic nutrients and carbon are, ultimately, again brought to the surface by advection and turbulent mixing which closes the OC-cycle in the upper ocean. Thus, remineralisation rates of OC are a critical component of the biological pump. These rates are regulated by the lability of the material and the environmental conditions in the ambient water. Temperature is particularly important in regulating the rate of microbial respiration and, thus, remineralisation rates. A significant temperature dependence of the microbial metabolic activity in the ocean interior is expected, as this is a feature observed elsewhere in the biosphere. Such temperature dependence of microbial remineralisation of POC and DOC will alter the amount of material available for transport by the biological pump to the deep ocean. Very few studies on the lability of OC and temperature sensitivity of microbial degradation processes in the mesopelagic zone (∼100–1000m) have, to date, been carried out. Here, we present a comprehensive new experimental data set from all major ocean basins and quantify remineralisation rates of OC and their temperature sensitivity in long-term incubations of water from the upper 350m. Microbial respiration was measured by non-invasive oxygen optodes and oxygen consumption was used as a constraint for determining the remineralisation rates and temperature sensitivity by two complementary methods. First, we analysed the oxygen consumption from a multi-component OC-model where the concentration, remineralisation rates and temperature sensitivity of two bio-available (labile) pools of organic carbon were fitted to the data via a non-linear fitting procedure. Thereafter, a continuous OC-model was fitted to the data through an inverse method and information about lability, temperature sensitivity and structural composition of the OC-pool was analysed together with the results from the two-pool solutions. Median values of remineralisation rates from all experiments on material characterising sinking POC were found to be 0.6 and 0.05days−1 for the two decomposable pools corresponding to turnover times of 2 and 21days, respectively. Accordingly, solutions from the continuous model resulted in median turnover times between 6 and 11days. Similar analyses were carried out for the OC-pool characterising DOC. A significant bio-available OC-pool was found to be present in the surface layer with a median value from all experiments of 30μM TOC. The median values of all remineralisation rates from the two bio-available OC-pools were found to be 0.2 and 0.02days−1, corresponding to turnover times of 5 and 56days, respectively, in good agreement with previous studies. The corresponding temperature sensitivities, characterised by a Q10-value, were found to be about 1.9 for the POC-fraction whereas the DOC fraction was characterised with values above 2.8 for the continuous OC-models. The analysis of the structural composition indicated that the TOC distribution in the surface layer was characterised by more heterogeneous material in terms of lability compared with the POC material sampled from the upper 350m. Finally, we analyse the potential impact of the calculated temperature sensitivity on the general OC-cycling in the upper ocean and show that the implied reduction in OC-flux in a warmer ocean may have significant impact on nutrient cycling in general and also tends to reduce future ocean carbon uptake significantly.