That could be a boon to bottom feeders like clams, gray whales, walruses and eider ducks. But puffins, terns and other animals that eat plankton-munching fish may lose out, because they cannot penetrate even thin sea ice.

But it is not clear how those winners and losers will interact to reshape the Arctic ecosystem, said Walker Smith, a marine scientist at the the College of William and Mary who contributed to the study.

"We can't really give a good prediction of the effect of this shifting on food webs yet," he said.

Reprinted from Climatewire with permission from Environment & Energy Publishing, LLC. www.eenews.net, 202-628-6500

11 Comments

1. 1. letxequalx 08:07 PM 6/8/12

   Wouldn't it be fascinating if this turns out to be some sort of inadvertent self-balancing mechanism? Melting of ice from global warming produces bloom of aquatic flora which intern reduces available CO2- unlikely but possible.

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

2. 2. alan6302 11:31 PM 6/8/12

   I Watched on You-tube a video that claims the solar system is heating from the outside in. The video alleges that neither the sun nor the CO2 is responsible.

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

3. 3. mathewritchie in reply to alan6302 01:32 AM 6/9/12

   On youtube you can find all types of garbarge.

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

4. 4. jtdwyer in reply to letxequalx 04:38 AM 6/9/12

   That'd be great if it were true. In that case atmospheric co2 levels should soon begin to diminish...

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

5. 5. singing flea 09:02 AM 6/9/12

   While an increase in phytoplankton blooms is certainly going to help lower CO2 concentrations in the water, the increased albedo of the darker water near the surface, that was once ice, will add to the warming effect. It is also a forewarning of the increasing CO2 in the atmosphere and more a harbinger of change that will effect other aspects of the arctic ecosystem. Whether that is good or bad in the long term is not yet clear. It could backfire on the environment if the grazing animals that keep it in check don't arrive in time.
   
   Complex ecosystems defy attempts to fully understand all the consequences of rapid change.

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

6. 6. Trent1492 in reply to alan6302 11:53 AM 6/9/12

   @Alan,
   
   Alan Says: Watched on You-tube a video that claims the solar system is heating from the outside in. The video alleges that neither the sun nor the CO2 is responsible.
   
   Trent Says:I saw a youtube video that claimed the Queen of England was a reptilian wearing a body suit to disguise it. Amazing the nonsense you can find on the Internet, eh?
   

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

7. 7. Sinibaldi 11:53 AM 6/11/12

   Une cascade de pensées.
   
   L'attraction
   du soleil est
   comme la
   chanson qui
   vient dans
   la brume
   en donnant
   une poésie...
   
   Francesco Sinibaldi
   

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

8. 8. Owl905 12:13 PM 6/11/12

   Adding to Singing Flea's observations, the phytoplankton taking up CO2 accelerates ocean acidification. On balance, there's a reason for optimism because it does provide nutrients for the food web, and it could provide the Arctic Ocean equivalent of a 'desert rainy-season bloom'.
   
   However, don't put too much stock in the 25% extrapolation. The Arctic Ocean basin is in a state of serious disruption - massive warm inflows from the Atlantic, methane bursts in the East Siberian Sea, a gigantic freshwater gyre in the Beaufort Sea, increased freshwater from Greenland, and massive reductions in sea-ice level. The lack of history about the plankton bloom may have a simple explanation - this is a context phenom similar to plankton blooms around river delta dead zones.

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

9. 9. Coco.Gomez 07:44 PM 11/7/12

   I am a Biology student from Mexico, I found this discovery both fascinating and defining.
   Is there somewhere I can find the complete article, besides Science Magazine?

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

10. 10. jtdwyer in reply to Coco.Gomez 08:33 PM 11/7/12

    If you have access to a university library you may find the journal "Science" among its subscriptions.
    
    Since I don't, I extracted the little information available in this ClimateWire service blurb: I Googled ""Kevin Arrigo" "Don Perovich" arctic phytoplankton". Picking the first item listed, it happened to contain a link to the Science article: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/early/2012/06/06/science.1215065
    
    From that I got the title, & Googled "Massive Phytoplankton Blooms Under Arctic Sea Ice". Among the items listed (mostly news reports), I found one that mentioned "PDF" - it is adownload of the "Science" article:
    http://spg.ucsd.edu/people/Greg/Publications/ArrigoK_2012_Brevia.pdf
    
    I can't determine whether this is an authorized copy...
    Best wishes!

    Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

11. 11. jtdwyer in reply to Coco.Gomez 08:39 PM 11/7/12

    I forgot to mention - because this was part of a NASA project, there's a wealth of additional informaton available. Please see:
    http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/ocean-bloom.html

    Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this