Biogeochemistry and ecosystems of continental margins in the western North Pacific Ocean and their interactions and responses to external forcing – an overview and synthesis

Abstract

Abstract. In this special issue we examine the biogeochemical conditions and marine ecosystems in the major marginal seas of the western North Pacific Ocean, namely, the East China Sea, the Japan/East Sea to its north and the South China Sea to its south. They are all subject to strong climate forcing as well as anthropogenic impacts. On the one hand, continental margins in this region are bordered by the world's most densely populated coastal communities and receive tremendous amount of land-derived materials. On the other hand, the Kuroshio, the strong western boundary current of the North Pacific Ocean, which is modulated by climate oscillation, exerts strong influences over all three marginal seas. Because these continental margins sustain arguably some of the most productive marine ecosystems in the world, changes in these stressed ecosystems may threaten the livelihood of a large population of humans. This special issue reports the latest observations of the biogeochemical conditions and ecosystem functions in the three marginal seas. The studies exemplify the many faceted ecosystem functions and biogeochemical expressions, but they reveal only a few longterm trends mainly due to lack of sufficiently long records of well-designed observations. It is critical to develop and sustain time series observations in order to detect biogeochemical changes and ecosystem responses in continental margins and to attribute the causes for better management of the environment and resources in these marginal seas.

A seamless ensemble-based reconstruction of surface ocean <i>p</i>CO<sub>2</sub> and air–sea CO<sub>2</sub> fluxes over the global coastal and open oceans

“…The influx density is 1.444 ± 0.130 molC m −2 yr −1 . Western coastal systems and shelf seas are under the influence of the delivery of fresh water and nutrients by large river systems (Liu et al, 2014). The resulting intense biological production contributes to influx densities per unit area that are higher over the western continental shelf and seas (e.g.…”

Palaeoenvironments and elemental geochemistry across the marine Permo‐Triassic boundary section, Guryul Ravine (Kashmir, India) and a comparison with other North Indian passive margin sections

“…The North Atlantic passive margin has no large offshore islands unlike the Permian western Panthalassic Ocean. The western North Pacific, however, has numerous magmatic arcs on continental fragments that, although related to subduction, are still similar in their oceanic effect to the rifted island in the Palaeotethys ocean, and their associated marginal back-arc oceans with their passive margins rest partly on continental crust (Liu et al, 2014). Translating the western North Pacific margin to a southern hemisphere position gives a palaeoceanographic situation very similar to the southern hemisphere northeastern Gondwana margin ( Figure 9).…”

Water Mass Control on Phytoplankton Spatiotemporal Variations in the Northeastern East China Sea and the Western Tsushima Strait Revealed by Lipid Biomarkers

“…Margin seas of the western North Pacific Ocean are important regions to study the changing land‐ocean interaction zone, due to the strong and complex influence of climate forcing and anthropogenic activities in this area (K.‐K. Liu et al, ). Such significant changes at the land‐ocean boundaries have shown strong feedback into the global biogeochemical system (Chen et al, ; Chen & Borges, ).…”