Ocean Carbon & Biogeochemistry

FAIR Data Practices for Marine Ecological Time Series

International Workshop: FAIR Data Practices for Ship-based Marine Ecological Time Series Photo credits: O. Arsenault (above) and B. Siddle (ASU/BIOS) (feature photo) Sustained ocean time series measurements are fundamental to distinguish between natural and human-induced variability in ecosystems and processes required to advance ecological forecasting. Since 2007, OCB has led and contributed to numerous efforts […]

OCB2025 schedule – science, connection, community

Constraining the dark ocean carbon cycle: Implications for ocean carbon budgets? (Co-chairs: Anne Dekas, Anela Choy, Jeff Bowman, Randie Bundy) Rivers to coasts: Biogeochemical linkages and environmental resilience (joint with North American Carbon Program) (Co-chairs: Fei Da, Kanchan Maiti, Shaily Rahman, Libby Larson, David Butman) Rapidly changing systems (Co-chairs: Kristen Krumhardt, Rachel Stanley, Melissa Melendez) […]

PAUSE on all bulk travel requests

Until further notice, OCB will not be able to consider bulk travel support requests. We will post an announcement if this changes.

Leaky Deltas workshop summary

The Leaky Deltas OCB workshop was held 17-20 March 2025 at Louisiana State University, in Baton Rouge, USA, which is situated within the Mississippi River delta. We brought together 57 members of the research community who study river deltas in the context of the global carbon cycle. The goal of the workshop was to create […]

New: Connecting Observations to Models

Ombres, E., H. Benway, K. Bisson, A. Larkin, L. Perotti, L. Wright-Fairbanks (eds.) (2024). Connecting Observations to Models: Biogeochemical Observing and Modeling Workshop, 2024 Summary Report and Suggested Steps Forward. Published Date: 2024 Series: NOAA technical memorandum OAR-OAP ; 6, DOI: https://doi.org/10.25923/wpdj-ja69

Welcoming new SSC members!

Welcome to the four new and one continuing SSC members! Jason Graff (Oregon State Univ.) (2027) Biooptics, satellite remote sensing Bror Jönsson (Univ. New Hampshire) (2027) – biological production across land-open ocean continuum, coastal ocean acidification, interactions between physical dynamics in the upper ocean and biological production, phytoplankton dynamics, and air-sea exchange, connectivity combining observations, […]

New workshop report: Ecological Forecasting

New workshop report from the joint OCB-US CLIVAR 2022 workshop Daily to Decadal Ecological Forecasting along North American Coastlines Capotondi, A., Coles, V. J., Clayton, S., Friedrichs, M., Gierach, M., Miller, A. J., and Stock, C. 2024. Daily to Decadal Ecological Forecasting Along North American Coastlines Workshop Report. 54pp. doi: 10.1575/1912/70991 Citable URI https://hdl.handle.net/1912/70991 Download here.

Recent Science Highlights

Tracing the biological carbon pump across diverse export regimes

The ocean’s biological carbon pump (BCP) plays a crucial role in regulating Earth’s climate. But how efficiently does it transport carbon to the deep? It has been difficult to answer this question because observations are sparse, labor-intensive, and the uncertainties of the BCP’s magnitude, which are nearly equivalent to human emissions. Fortunately, autonomous vehicles unlock […]

New over-determined CO2 system solver QUODcarb

Do you work with over-determined datasets of seawater carbon dioxide system chemistry? QUODcarb (Quantifying Uncertainty in an Over-Determined marine carbonate system), a new over-determined CO2-system solver is described in the recently published “QUODcarb: A Bayesian solver for over-determined datasets of seawater carbon dioxide system chemistry.” The Bayesian formulation of the novel solver and demonstrates its […]

Photoacclimation by phytoplankton under clouds

Unlike most remote sensing products, Net Primary Production (NPP) is computed under clouds. Since satellites can’t see through clouds, NPP models rely on clear-sky observations, interpolate model inputs, and assume that phytoplankton behavior stays the same, regardless of light conditions. But phytoplankton are known to photoacclimate, adjusting their internal chlorophyll to carbon ratio in response […]

Microbial Iron limitation in the ocean’s twilight zone

How deep in the ocean do microbes feel the effects of nutrient limitation? Microbial production in one third of the surface ocean is limited by the essential micronutrient iron (Fe). This limitation extends to at least the bottom of the euphotic zone, but what happens below that? In a study that recently published in Nature […]

How do ocean microbes share the job of denitrification?

Denitrification is a crucial multi-step process for ecosystem productivity and sustainability because some of its steps can result in the loss of the essential nutrient nitrogen or the production of greenhouse gas nitrous oxide. We do not understand why microbial functional groups conducting different steps of denitrification can coexist in the ocean and why certain […]

The ocean is shifting toward phosphorus limitation

Biogeochemical models predict that ocean warming is weakening the vertical transport of nutrients to the upper ocean, with severe implications for marine productivity. However, nutrient concentrations across the ocean surface often fall below detection limits, making it difficult to observe long-term changes. In a recent study in PNAS, we analyzed over 30,000 nitrate and phosphate […]