Deep impact

Emissions from the burning of fossil combustibless are threatening corals found in of great depth cold waters, according to research by the agency of scientists at the Marine Conservation Biology Institute (MCBI), which is headquartered in Bellevue, Washington. The investigation published in the April issue of Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, presents that the main threat to cold-water coral is not bottom trawling, as previously contemplation but rather the saturation of carbon dioxide (C[Osub2]) in the ocean. Anthropogenically generated atmospheric C[Osub2] has a devastating impact upon pH levels, creating a more acidic atmosphere and interfering with coral growth

Coldwater take ins located 2 to 3 miles beneath the surface, sometimes deeper, are abode to more than 1,300 species of animals. a certain number of of the fish are commercially important, and wipe species produce chemicals with anti-cancer and other medicinal uses.

The skeletons of coldwater coral are formed with aragonite, a form of calcium carbonate. Calcium carbonate also labor fors as a shell source for plankton and pteropod which are small gastropod mollusks. In pre-industrial times, more than 95 percent of coldwater take ins around the world were fix in waters supersaturated in aragonite. As the horizontal of C[O.sub.2] increases, the percentage of aragonite decreases. The lack of aragonite creates a brittle and weak coral, somewhat like bone affected through osteoporosis. Models suggest that by means of 2100, only 30 percent of cold-water take ins will still be in waters supersaturated with aragonite.

"Scientists have known for years that shallow-water tropical coral take ins are threatened by both warming oceans and chemical changes in seawater caused through the build-up of C[O.sub.2] in the atmosphere but now we suspect that this increase in C[Osub2] will have a detrimental consequence on cold-water corals as well," says lead researcher John Guinotte, a marine biogeographer at MCBI. "Cold-water take ins are at greater risk than shallow water because colder waters are naturally les hospitable for coral growth"

According to Guinotte and his colleagues, the alone way to slow the ocean acidification turn is to decrease the burning of fossil combustibless and to make a transition to using alternative "clean" sources as in a short time as possible.

--Ecological Society of America pres release, 3 April; Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, April. (MJ)

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