Chinese researchers propose coral reef ecological pump concept

BEIJING -- Chinese researchers have proposed a coral reef ecological pump concept to facilitate and enhance the study of the functions of coral ecosystem, according to the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).

Coral reefs with high productivity and biodiversity can flourish in oligotrophic tropical oceans. Increasing evidence shows that similar to water in an oasis in the desert, there are stable nutrient supplies to coral reefs in oligotrophic oceans.

The researchers from the South China Sea Institute of Oceanology of the CAS summarized the multiple input pathways of external nutrients, the storage of nutrients in reef organisms, the efficient retaining and recycling of dissolved and particulate organic matter within coral reef ecosystems, the distinctly high phytoplankton productivity and biomass inside and near oceanic coral reefs, and the export of reef-related organic carbon to adjacent open oceans.

All these properties enable coral reefs to function as ecological pumps for gathering nutrients across ecosystems and space, retaining and recycling nutrients within the ecosystem, supporting high phytoplankton productivity, and exporting organic carbon to adjacent open oceans, according to the recent research article published in the journal Acta Oceanologica Sinica.

Particularly, the high phytoplankton productivity and biomass make waters around coral reefs potential hotspots of carbon export to ocean depths via the biological pump. The study demonstrated that the organic carbon influx is vital for coral reef ecosystems' carbon budget and carbon export.

This concept of the coral reef ecological pump is expected to help improve understanding of the functioning of the coral reef ecosystem.