Through one of the primary carbon storage mechanisms, the biological carbon pump, phytoplankton (microscopic marine plants at the bottom of the oceanic food chain) take up CO 2 in the surface ocean ...

We estimate that the amount of carbon transported below the mixed layer by migrating zooplankton in the North Atlantic Ocean constitutes 27% (16–30%) of the total export flux associated with the ...

Without this biological carbon pump, atmospheric carbon dioxide levels would be around 50 per cent higher than they are today. But as our ocean warms, this zooplankton community is changing ...