Seasonal response of coccolithophores and its potential to reconstruct paleomonsoon in the eastern Indonesian seas: an overview

Abstract

Coccolithophore is a group of marine calcifying phytoplankton and its living distribution is sensitive to ecological change within the photic zone. Their coccoliths contribute majorly to the marine sediments and have become a reliable proxy in paleoceanography and paleoclimatology. The upper hydrology of the eastern Indonesian seas has been strongly influenced by seasonal climate change, the Australian-Indonesian monsoon. We review and discuss the result of previous studies on the response of living coccolithophore to seasonal change and the significance of their coccoliths as a proxy for reconstructing past dynamic of monsoon in the region. Coccolithophores abundance, species assemblages and coccolith malformation change in respond to the shift of photic environment condition modulated by reversing monsoon with particular responds across the region. Coccoliths variations in the marine sediment core archives from off southwest Sumba, eastern Banda Sea and Halmahera Sea show an insignificant control of glacial-interglacial climate variability to paleoproducitivity. Primary productivity based on the relative abundance of Florisphaera profunda has contributed to reconstruction of the past dynamic of Australian-Indonesian monsoon. However, more extensive and continuous observation of coccolithophores and their relationship with the photic environment in the eastern Indonesian seas is necessary for a better understanding of their response to monsoon dynamics in the present, past and future.