Ocean colour signature of climate change
Name
s41467-019-08457-x.pdf
Description
Published version
Size
4.83 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
ce9c8e4b584b99c206773a396d3e63f4
Author(s)
Dutkiewicz, Stephanie
Hickman, Anna E
Jahn, Oliver
Henson, Stephanie
Beaulieu, Claudie
Monier, Erwan
Date Issued
2019
Journal
Nature Communications
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Citation
Dutkiewicz, S., Hickman, A.E., Jahn, O. et al. Ocean colour signature of climate change. Nat Commun 10, 578 (2019).
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Monitoring changes in marine phytoplankton is important as they form the foundation of the marine food web and are crucial in the carbon cycle. Often Chlorophyll-a (Chl-a) is used to track changes in phytoplankton, since there are global, regular satellite-derived estimates. However, satellite sensors do not measure Chl-a directly. Instead, Chl-a is estimated from remote sensing reflectance (RRS): the ratio of upwelling radiance to the downwelling irradiance at the ocean’s surface. Using a model, we show that RRS in the blue-green spectrum is likely to have a stronger and earlier climate-change-driven signal than Chl-a. This is because RRS has lower natural variability and integrates not only changes to in-water Chl-a, but also alterations in other optically important constituents. Phytoplankton community structure, which strongly affects ocean optics, is likely to show one of the clearest and most rapid signatures of changes to the base of the marine ecosystem.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution
Persistent DSpace Link
DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-08457-x
