Abstract
Laboratory and field studies have demonstrated that fluid motion occurs at two locations in growing sea ice: in a network of brine channels and within the skeletal layer at the ice-water interface. Brine channel fluxes estimated using brine channel areal density from natural sea ice and channel velocities from laboratory studies are compared with recent measurements reported in the literature. Fluxes into the porous skeletal layer of sea ice may be estimated using rates of nutrient uptake by ice algae and adjacent seawater nutrient concentrations. Both approaches indicate fluxes of the order of 10-6 cc cm-2 s-1 (l m-2 h-1), which are about equal to fluxes reported in bioirrigated sediments. Fluxes of this magnitude indicate a very short residence time for the liquid phase in the skeletal layer, suggesting that this fluid motion may be important in maintaining the ice algae community. © 1984 Springer-Verlag.
Highlights
Interfaces, such as the air-sea interface and the sedimentwater interface, are well known as the sites of mass transport processes and enhanced biological and chemical activity
This paper summarizes recent field and laboratory work on the sea ice interface and uses the results to place bounds on volume fluxes across this interface
The fluxes associated with convective motion in brine channels may be estimated using the reported velocities for individual channels and areal density of the brine channels
Summary
Interfaces, such as the air-sea interface and the sedimentwater interface, are well known as the sites of mass transport processes and enhanced biological and chemical activity. The sea ice-water interface is recognized as a biologically active interface (Alexander and Chapman 1981) and serves as substrate for a population of epontic ice algae. These algae, consisting largely of diatoms, are responsible for the first significant primary production in ice-covered seas each spring. This paper summarizes recent field and laboratory work on the sea ice interface and uses the results to place bounds on volume fluxes across this interface. These fluxes are compared with fluxes across a more familiar interface where biological irrigation rates have been measured recently, the sediment-water interface. The sea ice-water interface, with circulation driven by purely physical processes, appears to be as actively flushed as intensively bioirrigated sediments
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