UNB, Dhaka :
Climate change could dramatically alter the least accessible, most unknown habitat on the planet and minus; the deep ocean floor.
Warming seas, the increasing acidification of the oceans and the loss of oxygen from seawater could destroy ecosystems in the ocean’s dark abyss, and drastically change the biodiversity of the deep sea, according to new research.
Around 70 percent of the planet is covered by water. The deep ocean floor, kilometres below the surface, remains largely unexplored, but repeated dives and exploration by submersibles have revealed glimpses of an extraordinary and unexpected set of ecosystems, far from the sun’s radiation.
However, a new study published in Elementa journal warns that changes at the surface could have profound consequences far below, according to a Climate News Network report received from London on Friday.
“Biodiversity in many of these areas is defined by the meagre amount of food reaching the seafloor, and over the next 80-plus years – in certain parts of the world – that amount of food will be cut in half,” says Andrew Thurber, an ocean ecologist at Oregon State University in the US.
“We’ll likely see a shift in dominance to smaller organisms. Some species will thrive, some will migrate to other areas, and many will die. Parts of the world will likely have more jellyfish and squid, for example, and fewer fish and cold water corals.”
He and colleagues looked at forecasts, derived from 31 Earth model systems developed for climate change research, to predict how oxygen levels, acidity, temperature and food supply would change for the creatures of the deep ocean floor by 2100.
The deepest reaches of the North Atlantic, Southern and Arctic Oceans could become between 0.5°C and 1 deg; C warmer. In mid-ocean – at between 3,000
metres and 200 metres depth – temperatures in the Pacific and Arctic could become 4 deg;C warmer.
Sea creatures are finely attuned to a particular water chemistry and temperature, and marine biologists have repeatedly observed shifts in fish populations with changes so far of only a fraction of a degree. A shift of 4 deg;C in an ecosystem has no precedent in human history.
“Abyssal ocean environments, which are over 3,000 metres deep, are some of the most food-deprived regions on the planet,” says the research leader, Andrew Sweetman, associate professor at Heriot-Watt University’s Lyell Centre for Earth and Marine Science in Scotland.
“Since large fishes in particular avoid or do not survive in areas with low oxygen content, these changes can have far-reaching biological consequences,” says Dr Sunke Schmidtko, of the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research in Kiel.
Climate change could dramatically alter the least accessible, most unknown habitat on the planet and minus; the deep ocean floor.
Warming seas, the increasing acidification of the oceans and the loss of oxygen from seawater could destroy ecosystems in the ocean’s dark abyss, and drastically change the biodiversity of the deep sea, according to new research.
Around 70 percent of the planet is covered by water. The deep ocean floor, kilometres below the surface, remains largely unexplored, but repeated dives and exploration by submersibles have revealed glimpses of an extraordinary and unexpected set of ecosystems, far from the sun’s radiation.
However, a new study published in Elementa journal warns that changes at the surface could have profound consequences far below, according to a Climate News Network report received from London on Friday.
“Biodiversity in many of these areas is defined by the meagre amount of food reaching the seafloor, and over the next 80-plus years – in certain parts of the world – that amount of food will be cut in half,” says Andrew Thurber, an ocean ecologist at Oregon State University in the US.
“We’ll likely see a shift in dominance to smaller organisms. Some species will thrive, some will migrate to other areas, and many will die. Parts of the world will likely have more jellyfish and squid, for example, and fewer fish and cold water corals.”
He and colleagues looked at forecasts, derived from 31 Earth model systems developed for climate change research, to predict how oxygen levels, acidity, temperature and food supply would change for the creatures of the deep ocean floor by 2100.
The deepest reaches of the North Atlantic, Southern and Arctic Oceans could become between 0.5°C and 1 deg; C warmer. In mid-ocean – at between 3,000
metres and 200 metres depth – temperatures in the Pacific and Arctic could become 4 deg;C warmer.
Sea creatures are finely attuned to a particular water chemistry and temperature, and marine biologists have repeatedly observed shifts in fish populations with changes so far of only a fraction of a degree. A shift of 4 deg;C in an ecosystem has no precedent in human history.
“Abyssal ocean environments, which are over 3,000 metres deep, are some of the most food-deprived regions on the planet,” says the research leader, Andrew Sweetman, associate professor at Heriot-Watt University’s Lyell Centre for Earth and Marine Science in Scotland.
“Since large fishes in particular avoid or do not survive in areas with low oxygen content, these changes can have far-reaching biological consequences,” says Dr Sunke Schmidtko, of the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research in Kiel.
