Ocean acidification modifies biomolecule composition in organic matter through complex interactions.

The main source of marine organic carbon (OC) is autotrophic production, while heterotrophic degradation is its main sink. Increased anthropogenic CO2 release leads to ocean acidification and is expected to alter phytoplankton community composition, primary production rates and bacterial degradation processes in the coming decades with potential consequences for dissolved and particulate OC concentration and composition. Here we investigate effects of increased pCO2 on dissolved and particulate amino acids (AA) and carbohydrates (CHO), in arctic and sub-arctic planktonic communities in two large-scale mesocosm experiments. Dissolved AA concentrations responded to pCO2/pH changes during early bloom phases but did not show many changes after nutrient addition. A clear positive correlation in particulate AA was detected in post-bloom phases. Direct responses in CHO concentrations to changing pCO2/pH were lacking, suggesting that observed changes were rather indirect and dependent on the phytoplankton community composition. The relative composition of AA and CHO did not change as a direct consequence of pCO2 increase. Changes between bloom phases were associated with the prevailing nutrient status. Our results suggest that biomolecule composition will change under future ocean conditions but responses are highly complex, and seem to be dependent on many factors including bloom phase and sampling site.

Inter-annual variability of transparent exopolymer particles in the Arctic Ocean reveals high sensitivity to ecosystem changes.

Transparent exopolymer particles (TEP) are a class of marine gel particles and important links between surface ocean biology and atmospheric processes. Derived from marine microorganisms, these particles can facilitate the biological pumping of carbon dioxide to the deep sea, or act as cloud condensation and ice nucleation particles in the atmosphere. Yet, environmental controls on TEP abundance in the ocean are poorly known. Here, we investigated some of these controls during the first multiyear time-series on TEP abundance for the Fram Strait, the Atlantic gateway to the Central Arctic Ocean. Data collected at the Long-Term Ecological Research observatory HAUSGARTEN during 2009 to 2014 indicate a strong biological control with highest abundance co-occurring with the prymnesiophyte Phaeocystis pouchetii. Higher occurrence of P. pouchetii in the Arctic Ocean has previously been related to northward advection of warmer Atlantic waters, which is expected to increase in the future. Our study highlights the role of plankton key species in driving climate relevant processes; thus, changes in plankton distribution need to be accounted for when estimating the ocean's biogeochemical response to global change.

Acidification and warming affect prominent bacteria in two seasonal phytoplankton bloom mesocosms.

In contrast to clear stimulatory effects of rising temperature, recent studies of the effects of CO2 on planktonic bacteria have reported conflicting results. To better understand the potential impact of predicted climate scenarios on the development and performance of bacterial communities, we performed bifactorial mesocosm experiments (pCO2 and temperature) with Baltic Sea water, during a diatom dominated bloom in autumn and a mixed phytoplankton bloom in summer. The development of bacterial community composition (BCC) followed well-known algal bloom dynamics. A principal coordinate analysis (PCoA) of bacterial OTUs (operational taxonomic units) revealed that phytoplankton succession and temperature were the major variables structuring the bacterial community whereas the impact of pCO2 was weak. Prokaryotic abundance and carbon production, and organic matter concentration and composition were partly affected by temperature but not by increased pCO2 . However, pCO2 did have significant and potentially direct effects on the relative abundance of several dominant OTUs; in some cases, these effects were accompanied by an antagonistic impact of temperature. Our results suggest the necessity of high-resolution BCC analyses and statistical analyses at the OTU level to detect the strong impact of CO2 on specific bacterial groups, which in turn might also influence specific organic matter degradation processes.

Stimulated bacterial growth under elevated p CO2: results from an off-shore mesocosm study.

Marine bacteria are the main consumers of freshly produced organic matter. Many enzymatic processes involved in the bacterial digestion of organic compounds were shown to be pH sensitive in previous studies. Due to the continuous rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration, seawater pH is presently decreasing at a rate unprecedented during the last 300 million years but the consequences for microbial physiology, organic matter cycling and marine biogeochemistry are still unresolved. We studied the effects of elevated seawater pCO2 on a natural plankton community during a large-scale mesocosm study in a Norwegian fjord. Nine Kiel Off-Shore Mesocosms for Future Ocean Simulations (KOSMOS) were adjusted to different pCO2 levels ranging initially from ca. 280 to 3000 µatm and sampled every second day for 34 days. The first phytoplankton bloom developed around day 5. On day 14, inorganic nutrients were added to the enclosed, nutrient-poor waters to stimulate a second phytoplankton bloom, which occurred around day 20. Our results indicate that marine bacteria benefit directly and indirectly from decreasing seawater pH. During the first phytoplankton bloom, 5-10% more transparent exopolymer particles were formed in the high pCO2 mesocosms. Simultaneously, the efficiency of the protein-degrading enzyme leucine aminopeptidase increased with decreasing pH resulting in up to three times higher values in the highest pCO2/lowest pH mesocosm compared to the controls. In general, total and cell-specific aminopeptidase activities were elevated under low pH conditions. The combination of enhanced enzymatic hydrolysis of organic matter and increased availability of gel particles as substrate supported up to 28% higher bacterial abundance in the high pCO2 treatments. We conclude that ocean acidification has the potential to stimulate the bacterial community and facilitate the microbial recycling of freshly produced organic matter, thus strengthening the role of the microbial loop in the surface ocean.