Higher concentrations of trace elements and nutrients previously locked up in frozen soils (permafrost) are expected to increase as more river runoff reaches the Arctic.
Freshwater runoff from rivers and continental shelf sediments are bringing significant quantities of carbon and trace elements into parts of the Arctic Ocean via the Transpolar Drift—a major surface current that moves water from Siberia across the North Pole to the North Atlantic Ocean, according to a new study by researchers at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) and their international colleagues.
In 2015, oceanographers conducting research in the Arctic Ocean as part of the International GEOTRACES program found much higher concentrations of trace elements in surface waters near the North Pole than in regions on either side of the current. Their results published this week in AGU’s Journal of Geophysical Research-Oceans.
“Many important trace elements that enter the ocean from rivers and shelf sediments are quickly removed from the water column,” explains WHOI marine chemist Matthew Charette, lead author of the study. “But in the Arctic, they are bound with abundant organic matter from rivers, which allows the mixture to be transported into the central Arctic, over 1,000 kilometers from their source.”
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