Tropical seagrass meadows modify seawater carbon chemistry: implications for coral reefs impacted by ocean acidification
By Richard K. F. Unsworth, Catherine J. Collier, G. Henderson, L. McKenzie. 2012
210 citations recorded by the source corpus.
Highly productive tropical seagrasses often live adjacent to or among coral reefs and utilize large amounts of inorganic carbon. In this study, the effect of seagrass productivity on seawater carbonate chemistry and coral calcification was modelled on the basis of an analysis of published data. Published data (11 studies, 64 records) reveal that seagrass meadows in the Indo-Pacific have an 83% chance of being net autotrophic, resulting in an average net sink of 155 gC m−2 yr−1. The capacities for seagrass productivity were analysed using an empirical model to examine the effect on seawater carbonate chemistry. Our analyses indicate that increases in pH of up to 0.38 units, and Ωarag increases of 2.9 are possible in the presence of seagrass meadows (compared to their absence) with the precise values of these increases dependent on water residence time (tidal flushing) and water depth. In shallow water reef environments, Scleractinian coral calcification downstream of seagrass has the potential to be ≈18% greater than in an environment without seagrass. If this potential benefit to reef calcifiers is supported by further study it offers a potential tool in marine park management at a local scale. The applicability of this will depend upon local physical conditions as well as the spatial configuration of habitats, and the factors that influence their productivity. This novel study suggests that, in addition to their importance to fisheries, sediment stabilization and primary production, seagrass meadows may enhance coral reef resilience to future ocean acidification.
Subfields: Ecology, Oceanography
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/687ad7122997f899ecf1b8bd1a60cc657417a2a3
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In Ecology
- David John Suggett
- David J. Smith
- I. Nagelkerken
- J. Jompa
- C. Pansch
- Y. Sawall
- V. Saderne
- C. Manfrino
In Oceanography
- David J. Smith
- David John Suggett
- I. Nagelkerken
- J. Jompa
- Y. Sawall
- V. Saderne
- Peter J. Mumby
- L. McCook
Citations in the corpus
- Mangrove and Seagrass Beds Provide Different Biogeochemical Services for Corals Threatened by Climate Change (2016, background): “…that the variability in carbonate 511 chemistry of seagrass habitats is tightly coupled with the local cover of photoautotrophs (field 512 studies: Manzello et al., 2012; Hendriks et al., 2014; modelling: Unsworth et al., 2012; 513 laboratory analysis: Semesi et al., 2009b; Anthony et al., 2011).”
- Biological mechanisms supporting adaptation to ocean acidification in coastal ecosystems (2015, unknown): “Likewise in patchy landscape configurations, bivalves and some coral species may benefit from the increase in pH by the metabolism of the adjacent seagrass meadow (e.g. Kleypas et al., 2011; Unsworth et al., 2012).”
- Potential for landscape-scale positive interactions among tropical marine ecosystems (2014, background): “The rise in calcification of coral reefs only occurred when seagrasses were neighbouring coral reefs (Unsworth et al. 2012).”
- Macroalgae may mitigate ocean acidification effects on mussel calcification by increasing pH and its fluctuations (2018, background): “…effects by primary producers were reported by some tropical studies showing that photosynthesizing macrophytes could mitigate the negative impact of OA on marine calcifiers such as corals at the habitat scale (Kleypas et al. 2011; Manzello et al. 2012; Unsworth et al. 2012; Jokiel et al. 2014).”