Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Carbon dioxide equilibrates between the atmosphere and the ocean's surface layers. As autotrophs add or subtract carbon dioxide from the water through photosynthesis or respiration, they modify this balance, allowing the water to absorb more carbon dioxide or causing it to emit carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. [2]
Carbon dioxide also dissolves directly from the atmosphere into bodies of water (ocean, lakes, etc.), as well as dissolving in precipitation as raindrops fall through the atmosphere. When dissolved in water, carbon dioxide reacts with water molecules and forms carbonic acid, which contributes to ocean acidity. It can then be absorbed by rocks ...
In the water cycle, the universal solvent water evaporates from land and oceans to form clouds in the atmosphere, and then precipitates back to different parts of the planet. Precipitation can seep into the ground and become part of groundwater systems used by plants and other organisms, or can runoff the surface to form lakes and rivers.
Wetland soil is an important carbon sink; 14.5% of the world's soil carbon is found in wetlands, while only 5.5% of the world's land is composed of wetlands. [70] Not only are wetlands a great carbon sink, they have many other benefits like collecting floodwater, filtering out air and water pollutants, and creating a home for numerous birds ...
The global soils contain up to 3150 Pg of carbon, of which 450 Pg exist in wetlands and 400 Pg in permanently frozen soils. The soils contain more than four times the carbon as the atmosphere. [30] Researchers have estimated that soil respiration accounts for 77 Pg of carbon released to the atmosphere each year. [31]
Soil carbon is present in two forms: inorganic and organic. Soil inorganic carbon consists of mineral forms of carbon, either from weathering of parent material, or from reaction of soil minerals with atmospheric CO 2. Carbonate minerals are the dominant form of soil carbon in desert climates. Soil organic carbon is present as soil organic matter.
When the water table is low, the methane generated within the wetland soil has to come up through the soil and get past a deeper layer of methanotrophic bacteria, thereby reducing emission. Methane transport by vascular plants can bypass this aerobic layer, thus increasing emission.
Parameterization in a weather or climate model is a method of replacing processes that are too small-scale or complex to be physically represented in the model by a simplified process. This can be contrasted with other processes—e.g., large-scale flow of the atmosphere—that are explicitly resolved within the models.