Abstract
GEOTRACES is an international program that has benefited from contributions by investigators in 35 nations. The program mission is to identify processes and quantify fluxes that control the distributions of key trace elements and isotopes in the ocean and to establish the sensitivity of these distributions to changing environmental conditions. This perspective first summarizes the historical motivation for the program, and then describes selected research highlights, focusing on recent findings related to iron. The patchy distribution of iron in the ocean indicates a short residence time, at the low end of the range of residence times estimated in models. Iron removal from the ocean must, therefore, be rapid. Recent results from the North Atlantic Ocean suggest that the formation of particulate authigenic iron phases may be a factor contributing to iron removal that is faster than previously thought. This article also identifies several areas where advancements are expected through modeling and synthesis efforts.
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