|
Kleypas, J. A., & Yates, K. K. (2009). Coral reefs and ocean acidification. Oceanography, 22(4), 108-117
|
Global
|
The decline in calcium carbonate production, coupled with an increase in calcium carbonate dissolution, will diminish reef building and the benefits that reefs provide, such as high structural complexity that supports biodiversity on reefs, and breakwater effects that protect shorelines and create quiet habitats for other ecosystems, such as mangroves and seagrass beds. These changes can degrade the reef's resilience (i.e., its ability to withstand disturbance) even while it appears visibly healthy, until at some point it can no longer sustain even minor disturbances, and becomes vulnerable to an ecological "regime shift", that is, a rapid transition to a different ecosystem state. As ocean acidification proceeds, more and more species will be affected. Some species will be losers (e.g., corals) and some will be winners (e.g., seagrasses), but the higher the proportion of species that are affected (including winners and losers), the higher the probability that some major function of the ecosystem (e.g., reef building, grazing, filter feeding, sediment turnover) will collapse, leading to a regime shift.
|
-
|