Duteil_etal 2012.pdf (3.7 MB)
Preformed and regenerated phosphate in ocean general circulation models: can right total concentrations be wrong?
journal contribution
posted on 2023-05-19, 08:16 authored by Duteil, O, Koeve, W, Oschlies, A, Aumont, O, Bianchi, D, Bopp, L, Galbraith, E, Matear, R, Moore, JK, Sarmiento, JL, Segschneider, JPhosphate distributions simulated by seven state-of-the-art biogeochemical ocean circulation models are evaluated against observations of global ocean nutrient distributions. The biogeochemical models exhibit different structural complexities, ranging from simple nutrient-restoring to multi-nutrient NPZD type models. We evaluate the simulations using the observed volume distribution of phosphate. The errors in these simulated volume class distributions are significantly larger when preformed phosphate (or regenerated phosphate) rather than total phosphate is considered. Our analysis reveals that models can achieve similarly good fits to observed total phosphate distributions for a~very different partitioning into preformed and regenerated nutrient components. This has implications for the strength and potential climate sensitivity of the simulated biological carbon pump. We suggest complementing the use of total nutrient distributions for assessing model skill by an evaluation of the respective preformed and regenerated nutrient components.
History
Publication title
BiogeosciencesVolume
9Issue
5Pagination
1797-1807ISSN
1726-4170Department/School
Institute for Marine and Antarctic StudiesPublisher
Copernicus GmbHPlace of publication
GermanyRights statement
Copyright 2012 Authors. Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported (CC BY 3.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/Repository Status
- Open