(ORDO NEWS) — Scientists have followed the process of gas exchange between water and air in the ocean.
The authors of the new work measured the ratio of isotopes of inert gases dissolved in seawater samples collected at a depth of up to 4.5 km in the North Atlantic.
Noble gases do not react and are not used by living organisms, which makes them useful indicators in physics – that is, their concentration is not affected by plants and animals.
Water samples for the study were taken from the BATS site (31°40 N, 64°10 W), long known among researchers and well suited for sampling.
The results confirmed that bubbles play a decisive role in the gas exchange between air and water in the northern part of the ocean, at high latitudes.
“The exchange of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases between the deep ocean and the atmosphere occurs at high latitudes in winter, especially during storms.
Measurements of inert gas concentrations deep in the North Atlantic Ocean confirmed the importance of large bubbles formed during storms, which greatly expanded our understanding of the rate of gas exchange at depth, ”explained study author William Smet.
The authors claim that their results improve the ability to quantify the exchange of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases between the ocean and the atmosphere and predict how their concentration in the atmosphere will affect the Earth‘s climate.
In turn, this is critical for building correct climate models and developing policies to mitigate global warming, since the ocean is a large repository of dissolved carbon dioxide.
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