| 1. |
- Brinkmann, Inda, et al.
(författare)
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Benthic Foraminiferal Mn/Ca as Low-Oxygen Proxy in Fjord Sediments
- 2023
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Ingår i: Global Biogeochemical Cycles. - 0886-6236. ; 37:5
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Fjord systems are typically affected by low-oxygen conditions, which are increasing in extent and severity, forced by ongoing global changes. Fjord sedimentary records can provide high temporal resolution archives to aid our understanding of the underlying mechanisms and impacts of current deoxygenation. However, such archives can only be interpreted with well-calibrated proxies. Bottom-water oxygen conditions determine redox regime and availability of redox-sensitive trace elements such as manganese, which in turn may be recorded by manganese-to-calcium ratios (Mn/Ca) in biogenic calcium carbonates (e.g., benthic foraminifera tests). However, biological influences on Mn incorporation (e.g., species-specific Mn fractionation, ontogeny, living and calcification depths) are still poorly constrained. We analyzed Mn/Ca of living benthic foraminifera (Bulimina marginata, Nonionellina labradorica), sampled at low- to well-oxygenated conditions over a seasonal gradient in Gullmar Fjord, Swedish West coast (71–217 μmol/L oxygen (O2)), by laser-ablation ICP-MS. High pore-water Mn availability in the fjord supported Mn incorporation by foraminifera. B. marginata recorded contrasting Mn redox regimes sensitively and demonstrated potential as proxy for low-oxygen conditions. Synchrotron-based scanning X-ray fluorescence nanoimaging of Mn distributions across B. marginata tests displayed Mn/Ca shifts by chambers, reflecting bottom-water oxygenation history and/or ontogeny-driven life strategy preferences. In contrast, Mn/Ca signals of N. labradorica were extremely high and insensitive to environmental variability. We explore potential biologically controlled mechanisms that could potentially explain this species-specific response. Our data suggest that with the selection of sensitive candidate species, the Mn/Ca proxy has potential to be further developed for quantitative oxygen reconstructions in the low-oxygen range.
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| 2. |
- Brinkmann, Inda, et al.
(författare)
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Drought recorded by Ba/Ca in coastal benthic foraminifera
- 2022
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Ingår i: Biogeosciences. - : Copernicus GmbH. - 1726-4170 .- 1726-4189. ; 19:9, s. 2523-2535
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Increasing occurrences of extreme weather events, such as the 2018 drought over northern Europe, are a concerning issue under global climate change. High-resolution archives of natural hydroclimate proxies, such as rapidly accumulating sediments containing biogenic carbonates, offer the potential to investigate the frequency and mechanisms of such events in the past. Droughts alter the barium (Ba) concentration of near-continent seawater through the reduction in Ba input from terrestrial runoff, which in turn may be recorded as changes in the chemical composition (Ba/Ca) of foraminiferal calcium carbonates accumulating in sediments. However, so far the use of Ba/Ca as a discharge indicator has been restricted to planktonic foraminifera, despite the high relative abundance of benthic species in coastal, shallow-water sites. Moreover, benthic foraminiferal Ba/Ca has mainly been used in open-ocean records as a proxy for paleo-productivity. Here we report on a new geochemical data set measured from living (CTG-labeled) benthic foraminiferal species to investigate the capability of benthic Ba/Ca to record changes in river runoff over a gradient of contrasting hydroclimatic conditions. Individual foraminifera (Bulimina marginata, Nonionellina labradorica) were analyzed by laser-ablation ICP-MS over a seasonal and spatial gradient within Gullmar Fjord, Swedish west coast, during 2018-2019. The results are compared to an extensive meteorological and hydrological data set, as well as sediment and pore-water geochemistry. Benthic foraminiferal Ba/Ca correlates significantly to riverine runoff; however, the signals contain both spatial trends with distance to Ba source and species-specific influences such as micro-habitat preferences. We deduce that shallow-infaunal foraminifera are especially suitable as proxy for terrestrial Ba input and discuss the potential influence of water-column and pore-water Ba cycling. While distance to Ba source, water depth, pore-water geochemistry, and species-specific effects need to be considered in interpreting the data, our results demonstrate confidence in the use of Ba/Ca of benthic foraminifera from near-continent records as a proxy for past riverine discharge and to identify periods of drought.
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| 3. |
- Broman, Elias, 1985-, et al.
(författare)
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Biotic interactions between benthic infauna and aerobic methanotrophs mediate methane fluxes from coastal sediments
- 2024
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Ingår i: The ISME journal. - 1751-7370 .- 1751-7362. ; 18:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Coastal ecosystems dominate oceanic methane (CH4) emissions. However, there is limited knowledge about how biotic interactions between infauna and aerobic methanotrophs (i.e. CH4 oxidizing bacteria) drive the spatial-temporal dynamics of these emissions. Here, we investigated the role of meio- and macrofauna in mediating CH4 sediment-water fluxes and aerobic methanotrophic activity that can oxidize significant portions of CH4. We show that macrofauna increases CH4 fluxes by enhancing vertical solute transport through bioturbation, but this effect is somewhat offset by high meiofauna abundance. The increase in CH4 flux reduces CH4 pore-water availability, resulting in lower abundance and activity of aerobic methanotrophs, an effect that counterbalances the potential stimulation of these bacteria by higher oxygen flux to the sediment via bioturbation. These findings indicate that a larger than previously thought portion of CH4 emissions from coastal ecosystems is due to faunal activity and multiple complex interactions with methanotrophs.
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| 4. |
- Broman, Elias, 1985-, et al.
(författare)
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No evidence of light inhibition on aerobic methanotrophs in coastal sediments using eDNA and eRNA
- 2023
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Ingår i: Environmental DNA. - 2637-4943. ; 5:4, s. 766-781
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- It is estimated that up to half of global methane (CH4) emissions are derived from microbial processes in aquatic ecosystems. However, it is not fully understood which factors explain the spatial and temporal variability of these emissions. For example, light has previously been shown to both inhibit and stimulate aerobic methane-oxidizing bacteria (i.e., methanotrophs) in the water column. These contrasting results indicate that the mechanisms that light has on CH4 oxidation are not yet clearly known, even less so for benthic aerobic methanotrophs. Here, we tested whether light reaching the seafloor can inhibit methanotrophic activity on the sediment surface. We sampled and distributed over 40 intact sediment cores from two coastal sites (illuminated 10 m, and a dark site at 33 m water depth) into 0, 50, and 100 PAR light treatments. After 10 days, we found no difference between treatments for each site in pore-water CH4 concentrations, relative abundance of aerobic methanotrophs, or the number of RNA transcripts related to methane oxidation. Our results suggest that light attenuation in coastal waters does not significantly affect aerobic methanotrophs in coastal sediments.
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| 5. |
- Carstensen, Jacob, et al.
(författare)
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Hypoxia in the Baltic Sea : Biogeochemical Cycles, Benthic Fauna, and Management
- 2014
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Ingår i: Ambio. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0044-7447 .- 1654-7209. ; 43:1, s. 26-36
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Hypoxia has occurred intermittently over the Holocene in the Baltic Sea, but the recent expansion from less than 10 000 km(2) before 1950 to > 60 000 km(2) since 2000 is mainly caused by enhanced nutrient inputs from land and atmosphere. With worsening hypoxia, the role of sediments changes from nitrogen removal to nitrogen release as ammonium. At present, denitrification in the water column and sediments is equally important. Phosphorus is currently buried in sediments mainly in organic form, with an additional contribution of reduced Fe-phosphate minerals in the deep anoxic basins. Upon the transition to oxic conditions, a significant proportion of the organic phosphorus will be remineralized, with the phosphorus then being bound to iron oxides. This iron-oxide bound phosphorus is readily released to the water column upon the onset of hypoxia again. Important ecosystems services carried out by the benthic fauna, including biogeochemical feedback-loops and biomass production, are also lost with hypoxia. The results provide quantitative knowledge of nutrient release and recycling processes under various environmental conditions in support of decision support tools underlying the Baltic Sea Action Plan.
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| 6. |
- Funkey, Carolina, et al.
(författare)
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Hypoxia Sustains Cyanobacteria Blooms in the Baltic Sea
- 2014
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Ingår i: Environmental Science and Technology. - : American Chemical Society (ACS). - 0013-936X .- 1520-5851. ; 48:5, s. 2598-2602
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Nutrient over-enrichment is one of the classic triggering mechanisms for the occurrence of cyanobacteria blooms in aquatic ecosystems. In the Baltic Sea, cyanobacteria regularly occur in the late summer months and form nuisance accumulations in surface waters and their abundance has intensified significantly in the past 50 years attributed to human-induced eutrophication. However, the natural occurrence of cyanobacteria during the Holocene is debated. In this study, we present records of cyanobacteria pigments, water column redox proxies, and nitrogen isotopic signatures for the past ca. 8000 years from Baltic Sea sediment cores. Our results demonstrate that cyanobacteria abundance and nitrogen fixation are correlated with hypoxia occurring during three main intervals: (1) ca. 7000-4000 B.P. during the Littorina transgression, (2) ca. 1400-700 B.P. during the Medieval Climate Anomaly, and (3) from ca. 1950 A.D. to the present. Issues of preservation were investigated, and we show that organic matter and pigment profiles are not simply an artifact of preservation. These results suggest that cyanobacteria abundance is sustained during periods of hypoxia, most likely because of enhanced recycling of phosphorus in low oxygen conditions.
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| 7. |
- Jilbert, Tom, et al.
(författare)
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Anthropogenic Inputs of Terrestrial Organic Matter Influence Carbon Loading and Methanogenesis in Coastal Baltic Sea Sediments
- 2021
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Ingår i: Frontiers in Earth Science. - : Frontiers Media SA. - 2296-6463. ; 9
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Coastal regions globally have experienced widespread anthropogenic eutrophication in recent decades. Loading of autochthonous carbon to coastal sediments enhances the demand for electron acceptors for microbial remineralization, often leading to rearrangement of the sediment diagenetic zonation and potentially enhancing fluxes of methane and hydrogen sulfide from the seafloor. However, the role of anthropogenic inputs of terrestrial organic matter (OMterr.) in modulating diagenesis in coastal sediments is often overlooked, despite being of potential importance in regions of land-use and industrial change. Here we present a dated 4-m sediment and porewater geochemistry record from a eutrophic coastal location in the northern Baltic Sea, to investigate sources of recent carbon loading and their impact on modern diagenetic processes. Based on an end-member mixing model of sediment N/C ratios, we observe that a significant fraction of the late-20th century carbon loading at this location was contributed by OMterr.. Furthermore, analysis of lignin in this material shows depleted ratios of syringyl/vanillyl (S/V) and cinnamyl/vanillyl (C/V) phenols, indicative of enhanced inputs of woody gymnosperm tissue likely from forest industries. The rapid loading of organic matter from combined terrestrial and autochthonous sources during the late 20th century has stimulated methanogenesis in the sediment column, and shoaled the sulfate-methane transition zone (SMTZ) to a depth of 5–20 cm. Optical parameters of colored dissolved organic matter confirm that OMterr. is actively degrading in the methanogenic layer, implying a role for this material in diagenetic processes. Porewater CH4, SO42− δ13C-DIC, and ∑S2− data suggest that the modern SMTZ is a broad zone in which organoclastic sulfate reduction, methanogenesis and anaerobic oxidation of methane (AOM) co-occur. However, fluxes of CH4 and SO42− show that rates of these processes are similar to other marine locations with a comparably shallow SMTZ. We suggest that the shallow depth of the modern SMTZ is the principal reason for high observed diffusive and ebullitive methane fluxes from sediments in this area. Our results highlight that anthropogenic activities lead to multiple pathways of carbon loading to coastal sediments, and that forest industry impacts on sedimentation in the northern Baltic Sea may be more widespread than previously acknowledged.
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| 8. |
- Jilbert, Tom, et al.
(författare)
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Glacio-isostatic control on hypoxia in a high-latitude shelf basin
- 2015
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Ingår i: Geology. - 0091-7613 .- 1943-2682. ; 43:5, s. 427-430
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In high-latitude continental shelf environments, late Pleistocene glacial overdeepening and early Holocene eustatic sea-level rise combined to create restricted marine basins with a high vulnerability to oxygen depletion. Here we show that ongoing glacio-isostatic rebound during the Holocene may have played an important role in determining the distribution of past hypoxia in these environments by controlling the physical exchange of water masses and the distribution of large-scale phosphorus (P) sinks. We focus on the Baltic Sea, where sediment records from a large, presently oxic sub-basin show evidence for intense hypoxia and cyanobacteria blooms during the Holocene Thermal Maximum. Using paleobathymetric modeling, we show that this period was characterized by enhanced deep-water exchange, allowing widespread phosphorus regeneration. Intra-basin sills then shoaled over a period of several thousand years, enhancing P burial in one of the sub-basins. Together with climate forcing, this may have caused the termination of hypoxia throughout the Baltic Sea. Similar rearrangements of physical and chemical processes likely occurred in response to glacio-isostatic rebound in other high-latitude shelf basins during the Holocene.
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| 9. |
- Jilbert, Tom, et al.
(författare)
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Iron-Phosphorus Feedbacks Drive Multidecadal Oscillations in Baltic Sea Hypoxia
- 2021
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Ingår i: Geophysical Research Letters. - : American Geophysical Union (AGU). - 0094-8276 .- 1944-8007. ; 48:24
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Hypoxia has occurred intermittently in the Baltic Sea since the establishment of brackish-water conditions at ∼8,000 years B.P., principally as recurrent hypoxic events during the Holocene Thermal Maximum (HTM) and the Medieval Climate Anomaly (MCA). Sedimentary phosphorus release has been implicated as a key driver of these events, but previous paleoenvironmental reconstructions have lacked the sampling resolution to investigate feedbacks in past iron-phosphorus cycling on short timescales. Here we employ Laser Ablation (LA)-ICP-MS scanning of sediment cores to generate ultra-high resolution geochemical records of past hypoxic events. We show that in-phase multidecadal oscillations in hypoxia intensity and iron-phosphorus cycling occurred throughout these events. Using a box model, we demonstrate that such oscillations were likely driven by instabilities in the dynamics of iron-phosphorus cycling under preindustrial phosphorus loads, and modulated by external climate forcing. Oscillatory behavior could complicate the recovery from hypoxia during future trajectories of external loading reductions.
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| 10. |
- Kuliński, Karol, et al.
(författare)
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Biogeochemical functioning of the Baltic Sea
- 2022
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Ingår i: Earth System Dynamics. - : Copernicus GmbH. - 2190-4979 .- 2190-4987. ; 13, s. 633-685
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Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- Location, specific topography, and hydrographic setting together with climate change and strong anthropogenic pressure are the main factors shaping the biogeochemical functioning and thus also the ecological status of the Baltic Sea. The recent decades have brought significant changes in the Baltic Sea. First, the rising nutrient loads from land in the second half of the 20th century led to eutrophication and spreading of hypoxic and anoxic areas, for which permanent stratification of the water column and limited ventilation of deep-water layers made favourable conditions. Since the 1980s the nutrient loads to the Baltic Sea have been continuously decreasing. This, however, has so far not resulted in significant improvements in oxygen availability in the deep regions, which has revealed a slow response time of the system to the reduction of the land-derived nutrient loads. Responsible for that is the low burial efficiency of phosphorus at anoxic conditions and its remobilization from sediments when conditions change from oxic to anoxic. This results in a stoichiometric excess of phosphorus available for organic-matter production, which promotes the growth of N2-fixing cyanobacteria and in turn supports eutrophication. This assessment reviews the available and published knowledge on the biogeochemical functioning of the Baltic Sea. In its content, the paper covers the aspects related to changes in carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus (C, N, and P) external loads, their transformations in the coastal zone, changes in organic-matter production (eutrophication) and remineralization (oxygen availability), and the role of sediments in burial and turnover of C, N, and P. In addition to that, this paper focuses also on changes in the marine CO2 system, the structure and functioning of the microbial community, and the role of contaminants for biogeochemical processes. This comprehensive assessment allowed also for identifying knowledge gaps and future research needs in the field of marine biogeochemistry in the Baltic Sea. Copyright:
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