Flexible diel vertical migration behaviour of zooplankton in the Irish Sea

The diel vertical migration (DVM) of the whole plankton community was investigated in the central and coastal Irish Sea. Generally, more than 60% of the plankton did not perform significant DVM. A correlation analysis of the weighted mean depths of different organisms and their potential predators suggested relationships between two groups, Oithona spp., copepod nauplii and fish larvae, and between Pseudocalanus elongatus, Calanus spp. and chaetognaths. The organisms showing significant DVM were chaetognaths (Sagitta spp.), Calanus spp. and P. elongatus. Calanus spp. showed clear ontogenic variations in DVM, and along with P. elongatus demonstrated great flexibility both in the amplitude and direction of migration. P. elongatus did not migrate in the coastal area and Calanus spp. showed a clear reverse migration. The direction of migration appeared to be related to the vertical position of the chaetognaths in the water column during the day.

Global assessment of ocean carbon export by combining satellite observations and food-web models

The export of organic carbon from the surface ocean by sinking particles is an important, yet highly uncertain, component of the global carbon cycle. Here we introduce a mechanistic assessment of the global ocean carbon export using satellite observations, including determinations of net primary production and the slope of the particle size spectrum, to drive a food-web model that estimates the production of sinking zooplankton feces and algal aggregates comprising the sinking particle flux at the base of the euphotic zone. The synthesis of observations and models reveals fundamentally different and ecologically consistent regional-scale patterns in export and export efficiency not found in previous global carbon export assessments. The model reproduces regional-scale particle export field observations and predicts a climatological mean global carbon export from the euphotic zone of ~6 Pg C yr−1. Global export estimates show small variation (typically < 10%) to factor of 2 changes in model parameter values. The model is also robust to the choices of the satellite data products used and enables interannual changes to be quantified. The present synthesis of observations and models provides a path for quantifying the ocean's biological pump.