ORCID Profile
0000-0003-4107-1799
Current Organisation
Université du Québec à Rimouski
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Publisher: University of California Press
Date: 2019
DOI: 10.1525/ELEMENTA.372
Abstract: Arctic sea ice is experiencing a shorter growth season and an earlier ice melt onset. The significance of spring microalgal blooms taking place prior to sea ice breakup is the subject of ongoing scientific debate. During the Green Edge project, unique time-series data were collected during two field c aigns held in spring 2015 and 2016, which documented for the first time the concomitant temporal evolution of the sea ice algal and phytoplankton blooms in and beneath the landfast sea ice in western Baffin Bay. Sea ice algal and phytoplankton blooms were negatively correlated and respectively reached 26 (6) and 152 (182) mg of chlorophyll a per m2 in 2015 (2016). Here, we describe and compare the seasonal evolutions of a wide variety of physical forcings, particularly key components of the atmosphere–snow–ice–ocean system, that influenced microalgal growth during both years. Ice algal growth was observed under low-light conditions before the snow melt period and was much higher in 2015 due to less snowfall. By increasing light availability and water column stratification, the snow melt onset marked the initiation of the phytoplankton bloom and, concomitantly, the termination of the ice algal bloom. This study therefore underlines the major role of snow on the seasonal dynamics of microalgae in western Baffin Bay. The under-ice water column was dominated by Arctic Waters. Just before the sea ice broke up, phytoplankton had consumed most of the nutrients in the surface layer. A subsurface chlorophyll maximum appeared and deepened, favored by spring tide-induced mixing, reaching the best compromise between light and nutrient availability. This deepening evidenced the importance of upper ocean tidal dynamics for shaping vertical development of the under-ice phytoplankton bloom, a major biological event along the western coast of Baffin Bay, which reached similar magnitude to the offshore ice-edge bloom.
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 11-2013
Publisher: Copernicus GmbH
Date: 27-01-2020
Abstract: Abstract. The Green Edge initiative was developed to investigate the processes controlling the primary productivity and fate of organic matter produced during the Arctic phytoplankton spring bloom (PSB) and to determine its role in the ecosystem. Two field c aigns were conducted in 2015 and 2016 at an ice c located on landfast sea ice southeast of Qikiqtarjuaq Island in Baffin Bay (67.4797∘ N, 63.7895∘ W). During both expeditions, a large suite of physical, chemical and biological variables was measured beneath a consolidated sea-ice cover from the surface to the bottom (at 360 m depth) to better understand the factors driving the PSB. Key variables, such as conservative temperature, absolute salinity, radiance, irradiance, nutrient concentrations, chlorophyll a concentration, bacteria, phytoplankton and zooplankton abundance and taxonomy, and carbon stocks and fluxes were routinely measured at the ice c . Meteorological and snow-relevant variables were also monitored. Here, we present the results of a joint effort to tidy and standardize the collected datasets, which will facilitate their reuse in other Arctic studies. The dataset is available at 0.17882/59892 (Massicotte et al., 2019a).
Publisher: University of California Press
Date: 2019
DOI: 10.1525/ELEMENTA.357
Abstract: During summer, phytoplankton can bloom in the Arctic Ocean, both in open water and under ice, often strongly linked to the retreating ice edge. There, the surface ocean responds to steep lateral gradients in ice melt, mixing, and light input, shaping the Arctic ecosystem in unique ways not found in other regions of the world ocean. In 2016, we s led a high-resolution grid of 135 hydrographic stations in Baffin Bay as part of the Green Edge project to study the ice-edge bloom, including turbulent vertical mixing, the under-ice light field, concentrations of inorganic nutrients, and phytoplankton biomass. We found pronounced differences between an Atlantic sector dominated by the warm West Greenland Current and an Arctic sector with surface waters originating from the Canadian archipelago. Winter overturning and thus nutrient replenishment was h ered by strong haline stratification in the Arctic domain, whereas close to the West Greenland shelf, weak stratification permitted winter mixing with high-nitrate Atlantic-derived waters. Using a space-for-time approach, we linked upper ocean dynamics to the phytoplankton bloom trailing the retreating ice edge. In a band of 60 km (or 15 days) around the ice edge, the upper ocean was especially affected by a freshened surface layer. Light climate, as evidenced by deep 0.415 mol m–2 d–1 isolumes, and vertical mixing, as quantified by shallow mixing layer depths, should have permitted significant net phytoplankton growth more than 100 km into the pack ice at ice concentrations close to 100%. Yet, under-ice biomass was relatively low at 20 mg chlorophyll-a m–2 and depth-integrated total chlorophyll-a (0–80 m) peaked at an average value of 75 mg chlorophyll-a m–2 only around 10 days after ice retreat. This phenological peak may hence have been the delayed result of much earlier bloom initiation and demonstrates the importance of temporal dynamics for constraints of Arctic marine primary production.
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 11-2013
Publisher: The Royal Society
Date: 31-08-2020
Abstract: Climate changes in the Arctic may weaken the currently tight pelagic-benthic coupling. In response to decreasing sea ice cover, arctic marine systems are expected to shift from a ‘sea-ice algae–benthos' to a ‘phytoplankton-zooplankton’ dominance. We used mollusc shells as bioarchives and fatty acid trophic markers to estimate the effects of the reduction of sea ice cover on the food exported to the seafloor. Bathyal bivalve Astarte moerchi living at 600 m depth in northern Baffin Bay reveals a clear shift in growth variations and Ba/Ca ratios since the late 1970s, which we relate to a change in food availability. Tissue fatty acid compositions show that this species feeds mainly on microalgae exported from the euphotic zone to the seabed. We, therefore, suggest that changes in pelagic-benthic coupling are likely due either to local changes in sea ice dynamics, mediated through bottom-up regulation exerted by sea ice on phytoplankton production, or to a mismatch between phytoplankton bloom and zooplankton grazing due to phenological change. Both possibilities allow a more regular and increased transfer of food to the seabed. This article is part of the theme issue ‘The changing Arctic Ocean: consequences for biological communities, biogeochemical processes and ecosystem functioning'.
No related grants have been discovered for Dany Dumont.