The Changing Carbonate Systems in Coastal, Estuarine, Shelf Areas and Marginal Seas

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Background

The world's oceans play a fundamental role in the exchange of carbon dioxide (CO2) with the

atmosphere and constitute an important sink for atmospheric CO2. It was estimated that oceans absorb one-third of the total annual anthropogenic CO2 emissions. This exchange greatly influences the biogeochemistry of ocean carbon and has a great impact on the acidification of the Earth’s oceans, biological production as well as on the distribution of pollutants. Therefore, is important to understand the processes that regulate the CO2 fluxes since the projections of climatic change are, in great proportion, dependent on the distribution of CO2 between the atmosphere, soil, and ocean. Considering

longer time periods, the most important processes influencing pCO2 in seawater are the dissolution of atmospheric CO2 (“solubility pump”) and relationship with sea currents and the biological uptake of carbon and transport from euphotic zone to ocean abyssal regions (“biological pump”). Although the coastal areas and marginal seas represent only 7% of the total ocean area, the input, production, and degradation of organic matter are much higher compared to the ocean waters suggesting that CO2 fluxes are very intensive and important in the global carbon budget.

Global atmospheric CO2 concentrations have increased from 320 ppm in the 1960s to a present-day value of 414 ppm due mainly to anthropogenic activities. This increase, along with other human-driven environmental alterations, influences the seawater carbonate system, impacting the marine ecosystem. Although the science of the marine ecosystem continues to develop, there are still gaps that need to be resolved for predicting how these marine systems respond to current and future CO2 levels.



This Research Topic encourages researchers to submit original papers from different marine areas: coastal, estuarine, shelf areas, and marginal seas that are particularly sensitive to changing atmospheric conditions, riverine inputs, air-sea CO2 exchanges, and multiple acid-base reactions that can alter carbonate chemistry. Papers on the long-term trends of CO2 system descriptors, as well as the interactions with calcifying organisms, are also welcome. Importantly, any actions to mitigate the change in pH will require adaptive management of multiple stressors simultaneously across several spatial scales.

Keywords: CO2, Carbonate Chemistry, Calcifying Organisms, Coastal, Estuarine, Shelf, Marginal Seas

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

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