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Dissolved zinc in the subarctic North Pacific and Bering Sea: Its distribution, speciation, and importance to primary producers
Author(s) -
Jakuba Rachel Wisniewski,
Saito Mak A.,
Moffett James W.,
Xu Yan
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
global biogeochemical cycles
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.512
H-Index - 187
eISSN - 1944-9224
pISSN - 0886-6236
DOI - 10.1029/2010gb004004
Subject(s) - subarctic climate , zinc , transect , phytoplankton , chlorophyll a , oceanography , nutrient , micronutrient , genetic algorithm , chlorophyll , environmental chemistry , water column , chemistry , environmental science , geology , biology , ecology , botany , organic chemistry
The eastern subarctic North Pacific, an area of high nutrients and low chlorophyll, has been studied with respect to the potential for iron to control primary production. The geochemistry of zinc, a critical micronutrient for diatoms, is less well characterized. Total zinc concentrations and zinc speciation were measured in near‐surface waters on transects across the subarctic North Pacific and across the Bering Sea. Total dissolved zinc concentrations in the near‐surface ranged from 0.10 nmol L −1 to 1.15 nmol L −1 with lowest concentrations in the eastern portions of both the North Pacific and Bering Sea. Dissolved zinc speciation was dominated by complexation to strong organic ligands whose concentration ranged from 1.1 to 3.6 nmol L −1 with conditional stability constants (K′ ZnL/Zn′ ) ranging from 10 9.3 to 10 11.0 . The importance of zinc to primary producers was evaluated by comparison to phytoplankton pigment concentrations and by performing a shipboard incubation. Zinc concentrations were positively correlated with two pigments that are characteristic of diatoms. At one station in the North Pacific, the addition of 0.75 nmol L −1 zinc resulted in a doubling of chlorophyll after 4 days.