New model of the ocean’s biological carbon pump

Oceans absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere through microscopic algae that carry out photosynthesis and then sink to the deep sea when they die. This sinking enhances the degradation processes, as D-BAUG researchers report in the journal "Nature Geoscience". Based on this fundamental observation, the team around Professor Roman Stocker has now designed a model of the biological carbon pump focusing on this novel coupling.