As a result of anthropogenic pCO2 increases, future oceans are growing warmer and lower in pH and oxygen, conditions that are likely to impact planktic communities. Past intervals of elevated and changing pCO2 and temperatures can offer a glimpse into the response of marine calcifying plankton to changes in surface oceans under conditions similar to those projected for the future. Here we prese...

The impact of an asteroid at the end of the Cretaceous caused mass extinctions in the oceans. A rapid collapse in surface to deepocean carbon isotope gradients suggests that transfer of organic matter to the deep sea via the biological pump was severely perturbed. However, this view has been challenged by the survival of deep-sea benthic organisms dependent on surface-derived food and uncertain...

At the western continental margin of the Barents Sea, 75°N, hemipelagic sediments provide a record of Holocene climate change with a time resolution of 10–70 years. Planktic foraminifera counts reveal a very early Holocene thermal optimum 10.7–7.7 kyr BP, with summer sea surface temperatures (SST) of 8°C and a much enhanced West Spitsbergen Current. There was a short cooling between 8.8 and 8.2...

About one third of the anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO2) released into the atmosphere in the past two centuries has been taken up by the ocean. As CO2 invades the surface ocean, carbonate ion concentrations and pH are lowered. Laboratory studies indicate that this reduces the calcification rates of marine calcifying organisms, including planktic foraminifera. Such a reduction in calcification ...

[1] We studied the seasonality of planktonic foraminifera during the Last Glacial Maximum using a foraminifera model coupled to an ecosystem model. The model suggests that the timing of the maximum seasonal production of planktonic foraminifera during the Last Glacial Maximum occurred at a different time of the year from present day. The assumption of ‘‘stable’’ seasonality through time, one of...

Specimens of Recent foraminifera of Amphistegina radiata, Peneroplis planatus and Globigerinoides ruber, from fifty samples of surface sediments of the continental margin of the State of Ceará, Brazil, have been analyzed for carbon and oxygen isotopes to investigate oceanographic parameters and determine the values of delta18O of the oceanic water. From a comparison between values of delta18O o...

Planktic foraminifera test iodine to calcium ratios represent an emerging proxy method assess subsurface seawater oxygenation states. Several core-top studies show lower planktic I/Ca in locations with oxygen depleted waters compared well oxygenated environments. The reasoning behind this trend is that only the oxidized species of iodine, iodate, incorporated foraminiferal calcite. calcite thou...