Biogeosciences, 15, 3071–3084, 2018 https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-15-3071-2018 © Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. The role of diatom resting spores in pelagic–benthic coupling in the Southern Ocean Mathieu Rembauville1, Stéphane Blain1, Clara Manno2, Geraint Tarling2, Anu Thompson3, George Wolff3, and Ian Salter1,4 1Sorbonne Universités, UPMC Univ. Paris 06, CNRS, Laboratoire d’Océanographie Microbienne (LOMIC), Observatoire Océanologique, 66650 Banyuls-sur-mer, France 2British Antarctic Survey, Natural Environmental Research Council, High Cross, Madingley Road, Cambridge, CB3 0ET, UK 3School of Environmental Sciences, 4 Brownlow Street, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, L69 3GP, UK 4Faroe Marine Research Institute, Box 3051, 110, Torshavn, Faroe Islands Correspondence: Ian Salter (
[email protected],
[email protected]) Received: 5 October 2017 – Discussion started: 10 October 2017 Revised: 20 March 2018 – Accepted: 13 April 2018 – Published: 18 May 2018 Abstract. Natural iron fertilization downstream of Southern statistical framework to link seasonal variation in ecological Ocean island plateaus supports large phytoplankton blooms flux vectors and lipid composition over a complete annual and promotes carbon export from the mixed layer. In ad- cycle. Our analyses demonstrate that ecological processes in dition to sequestering atmospheric CO2, the biological car- the upper ocean, e.g. resting spore formation and grazing, not bon pump also supplies organic matter (OM) to deep-ocean only impact the magnitude and stoichiometry of the Southern ecosystems. Although the total flux of OM arriving at the Ocean biological pump, but also regulate the composition of seafloor sets the energy input to the system, the chemical exported OM and the nature of pelagic–benthic coupling.