The impact of pollution on the Arctic began as soon as widespread fossil fuel usage took hold during the industrial era, according to a report in Nature Geoscience. The researchers detected this footprint in an unexpected place—they measured declines in an airborne byproduct of marine phytoplankton activity known as methanesulfonic acid, or MSA, captured in the ice cores when air pollution began to rise.
Phytoplankton are key species in ocean food webs and carbon cycles are considered a bellwether of the ocean’s response to climate change. MSA has been used by scientists as an indicator of reduced phytoplankton productivity and, thus, of an ocean ecosystem in distress.
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The impact of pollution on the Arctic began as soon as widespread fossil fuel usage took hold during the industrial era, according to a report in Nature Geoscience. The researchers detected this footprint in an unexpected place—they measured declines in an airborne byproduct of marine phytoplankton activity known as methanesulfonic acid, or MSA, captured in the ice cores when air pollution began to rise.
Phytoplankton are key species in ocean food webs and carbon cycles are considered a bellwether of the ocean’s response to climate change. MSA has been used by scientists as an indicator of reduced phytoplankton productivity and, thus, of an ocean ecosystem in distress.