Article Summary:

In a paper entitled Anthropogenic impacts on marine ecosystems in Antarctica, the authors have cataloged the human effects on a broad sample of Antarctic ecosystems. The team of US and UK scientists has drawn conclusions based on an extensive review of the impacts of a wide range of human activities. The Antarctic Treaty system, which includes environmental and fisheries management, provides an effective framework for the management and protection of the continent, but some of the threats are not currently being fully addressed.

Some of the impacts they list, such as pollution, can be relatively localized. However, global climate change caused by human emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases has the potential to affect the entire Antarctic region for decades to come. The researchers point out that rising sea temperatures are already affecting marine creatures adapted to living within a particular temperature range.

A second major consequence of carbon dioxide emission from human activities, ocean acidification, is also likely to take its toll.

“The Southern Ocean is the canary in the coal mine with respect to ocean acidification. This vulnerability is caused by a combination of ocean mixing patterns and low temperature enhancing the solubility of carbon dioxide,” noted co-author Dr. James McClintock of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, USA.