Imbalanced nutrient recycling in a warmer ocean driven by differential response of extracellular enzymatic activities

Begoña Ayo, Naiara Abad, Itxaso Artolozaga, Iñigo Azua, Zuriñe Baña, Marian Unanue, Josep M. Gasol, Carlos M. Duarte, Juan Iriberri

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18 Scopus citations

Abstract

Ocean oligotrophication concurrent with warming weakens the capacity of marine primary producers to support marine food webs and act as a CO2 sink, and is believed to result from reduced nutrient inputs associated to the stabilization of the thermocline. However, nutrient supply in the oligotrophic ocean is largely dependent on the recycling of organic matter. This involves hydrolytic processes catalyzed by extracellular enzymes released by bacteria, which temperature-dependence has not yet been evaluated. Here we report a global assessment of the temperature-sensitivity, as represented by the activation energies (Ea ), of extracellular β-glucosidase (βG), leucine aminopeptidase (LAP) and alkaline phosphatase (AP) enzymatic activities, which enable the uptake by bacteria of substrates rich in carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus, respectively. These Ea were calculated from two different approaches, temperature experimental manipulations and a space-for-time substitution approach, which generated congruent results. The three activities showed contrasting Ea in the subtropical and tropical ocean, with βG increasing the fastest with warming, followed by LAP, while AP showed the smallest increase. The estimated activation energies predict that the hydrolysis products under projected warming scenarios will have higher C:N, C:P and N:P molar ratios than those currently generated, and suggest that the warming of oceanic surface waters leads to a decline in the nutrient supply to the microbial heterotrophic community relative to that of carbon, particularly so for phosphorus, slowing down nutrient recycling and contributing to further ocean oligotrophication. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)4084-4093
Number of pages10
JournalGlobal Change Biology
Volume23
Issue number10
DOIs
StatePublished - Jun 26 2017

Bibliographical note

KAUST Repository Item: Exported on 2020-10-01
Acknowledgements: This is a contribution to the MALASPINA Expedition 2010 project, funded by the CONSOLIDER-Ingenio 2010 program from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (Ref. CSD2008-00077). NA was supported by a grant from the Basque Government (Ref. BFI-2010-130). We thank one anonymous reviewer for helpful comments on an earlier version of this manuscript. We thank the participants in the Malaspina Expedition and the crew of BIO Hespérides and the personnel of the Marine Technology Unit of CSIC (UTM) for their invaluable support.

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