Properties of seawater (partial pressure of carbon dioxide (pCO2)) from a ProOceanus CO2-Pro sensor mounted on the continuous surface water sampling system during the Tara Oceans expedition 2009-2013

The Tara Oceans Expedition (2009-2013) sampled the world oceans on board a 36 m long schooner, collecting environmental data and organisms from viruses to planktonic metazoans for later analyses using modern sequencing and state-of-the-art imaging technologies. Tara Oceans Data are particularly suited to study the genetic, morphological and functional diversity of plankton. The present data set provides continuous measurements of partial pressure of carbon dioxide (pCO2), using a ProOceanus CO2-Pro instrument mounted on the flowthrough system. This automatic sensor is fitted with an equilibrator made of gas permeable silicone membrane and an internal detection loop with a non-dispersive infrared detector of PPSystems SBA-4 CO2 analyzer. A zero-CO2 baseline is provided for the subsequent measurements circulating the internal gas through a CO2 absorption chamber containing soda lime or Ascarite. The frequency of this automatic zero point calibration was set to be 24 hours. All data recorded during zeroing processes were discarded with the 15-minute data after each calibration. The output of CO2-Pro is the mole fraction of CO2 in the measured water and the pCO2 is obtained using the measured total pressure of the internal wet gas. The fugacity of CO2 (fCO2) in the surface seawater, whose difference with the atmospheric CO2 fugacity is proportional to the air-sea CO2 fluxes, is obtained by correcting the pCO2 for non-ideal CO2 gas concentration according to Weiss (1974). The fCO2 computed using CO2-Pro measurements was corrected to the sea surface condition by considering the temperature effect on fCO2 (Takahashi et al., 1993). The surface seawater observations that were initially estimated with a 15 seconds frequency were averaged every 5-min cycle. The performance of CO2-Pro was adjusted by comparing the sensor outputs against the thermodynamic carbonate calculation of pCO2 using the carbonic system constants of Millero et al. (2006) from the determinations of total inorganic carbon (CT ) and total alkalinity (AT ) in discrete samples collected at sea surface. AT was determined using an automated open cell potentiometric titration (Haraldsson et al. 1997). CT was determined with an automated coulometric titration (Johnson et al. 1985; 1987), using the MIDSOMMA system (Mintrop, 2005). fCO2 data are flagged according to the WOCE guidelines following Pierrot et al. (2009) identifying recommended values and questionable measurements giving additional information about the reasons of the questionability.

Maize Stress DIESI-MS Data and R Script

Climatic change is an increasing challenge for agriculture that is driving the development of suitable crops in order to ensure supply for both human nutrition and animal feed. In this context, it is increasingly important to understand the biochemical responses of cells to environmental cues at the whole system level, an aim that is being brought closer by advances in high throughput, cost-efficient plant metabolomics. To support molecular breeding activities, we have assessed the economic, technical and statistical feasibility of using direct mass spectrometry methods to evaluate the physiological state of maize (Zea mays L.) plants grown under different stress conditions.

Annotated record of the detailed examination of Mn deposits from stations of R.R.S. "Discovery" Cruise 16

The cores and dredges described in this report were taken on Cruise 16 of the R.R.S. "Discovery" from January until May 1967 by the National Institute of Oceanography, Wormley, United Kingdom. A total of 73 cores and dredges were recovered and are available through the British Oceanographic Data Centre for sampling and study.

R-codes, and coral abundance, water temperature and transect characteristics of nearshore reefs in Belize

Coral reefs are increasingly threatened by global and local anthropogenic stressors, such as rising seawater temperature and nutrient enrichment. These two stressors vary widely across the reef face and parsing out their influence on coral communities at reef system scales has been particularly challenging. Here, we investigate the influence of temperature and nutrients on coral community traits and life history strategies on lagoonal reefs across the Belize Mesoamerican Barrier Reef System (MBRS). A novel metric was developed using ultra-high-resolution sea surface temperatures (SST) to classify reefs as enduring low (lowTP), moderate (modTP), or extreme (extTP) temperature parameters over 10 years (2003 to 2012). Chlorophyll-a (chl a) records obtained for the same interval were employed as a proxy for bulk nutrients and these records were complemented with in situ measurements to "sea truth" nutrient content across the three reef types. Chl a concentrations were highest at extTP sites, medial at modTP sites and lowest at lowTP sites. Coral species richness, abundance, diversity, density, and percent cover were lower at extTP sites compared to lowTP and modTP sites, but these reef community traits did not differ between lowTP and modTP sites. Coral life history strategy analyses showed that extTP sites were dominated by hardy stress-tolerant and fast-growing weedy coral species, while lowTP and modTP sites consisted of competitive, generalist, weedy, and stress-tolerant coral species. These results suggest that differences in coral community traits and life history strategies between extTP and lowTP/modTP sites were driven primarily by temperature differences with differences in nutrients across site types playing a lesser role. Dominance of weedy and stress-tolerant genera at extTP sites suggests that corals utilizing these two life history strategies may be better suited to cope with warmer oceans and thus may warrant further protective status during this climate change interval. Data associated with this project are archived here, including: -SST data -Satellite Chl a data -Nutrient measurements -Raw coral community survey data For questions contact Justin Baumann (j.baumann3 gmail.com)