Ocean Acidification Experiment

This lab started out when our class was reading an article on ocean acidification. The article was explaining that ocean acidification has been increasing. “Since the industrial revolution in the early 1800s, the ocean’s pH has dropped to 8.1, the equivalent of a 30 percent increase in acidity.” [1 hhmi] Our class began the lab to prove the increase in acidification in the ocean. Our guiding question is, what does different concentrations of acid do to shells? The hypothesis for the experiment is, the different concentrations of acid will decrease the mass of the shells.

The data from our experimental design supports the idea that the pH in the Chesapeake Bay is decreasing and becoming acidic. Our team used the following materials to test this idea:

Presented in an informal style of writing, “What Is Ocean Exploration and Why Is It Important?” inform its readers about the importance of researching and discovering the unknown ocean. It explains how much work is needed for the documentation of the ocean in varies areas, at the same time it addresses that scientist will be able to better understand the unknown oceans. For example, the time needed to obtain and study the result, as well as answer how the change in atmosphere will cause the ocean to react and affect life. The information obtain will also provide the baseline for scientist, researcher and government agencies to make important and dangerous decisions for the future. Sometime during research amazing things happen and new resources may be revealed. Besides informing about the ocean researching, the article also has a background idea as it is trying to encourage and get its readers interested into joining the field of ocean researching by emphasizing the role the ocean plays and how it will help ensure that ocean resources are well managed for future generations to enjoy.

Ocean Acidification is a process that occurs everyday and majorly affects our planet, but most people don’t even realize it exists. Though it can technically be argued that Ocean Acidification has some benefits for the planet, most of the time the effects of this process are very poor and negatively affect the entire world around us. Human evolution has played a major role in contributing to Ocean Acidification. Whenever humans use energy we release Carbon Dioxide into the atmosphere or also known as CO2. This can be in the form of burning fossil fuels from the ground or the removal of national forest by burning. CO2 is a greenhouse gas, which means whenever we can emit it in large quantities or unnatural amounts it can have negative effects on the atmosphere. These high levels of CO2 in the atmosphere result in climate change and more specifically Ocean Acidification. Ocean Acidification occurs when excess Carbon Dioxide is absorbed into the ocean. When this process takes place it can completely disturb the chemical balances of the water. For example, it can reduce pH levels, Biodiversity, and the abundance of calcifying species.

Hi Professor Searcy below is the link to the new paper that we briefly talked about in class. I haven't gotten a chance to look over it any further since we talked but maybe if you have some free time and have a strong desire to learn more about the effects that ocean acidification has on yellow tuna fish larvae you could glance it over just to see if there was any significance to them conducting two trials other than just for additional accuracy.

The purpose of this study was to understand and based on results to support the predictable negative effects of ocean acidification on phytoplankton and projected pH values. However, changes in ocean pH did not negatively impact the productivity of phytoplankton according to the log response ratios, which compared the growth rates at projected years (2000, 2100,

I am a water loving science geek teenager, who has dreamed of being a marine biologist since I was a child. My love of water started when I was four years old participating in my first swim lesson at my local YMCA, which I now work at as a lifeguard and swim instructor. My water passion has continued throughout my life advancing through swim lesson to club and high school swimming. One of my proudest moments was swimming with kids twice my age and keeping up the whole swim lesson, which for me was more of a practice. After that, swim lesson extremely tired, but could not wait to go back.

As Dr. Stamper discussed, ocean acidification is a major factor that affects the environment. Both of these have had huge effects on the health and vitality of coral reefs. Since the Industrial Revolution, the pH of the ocean has decreased by 30% and this will have ramifications on the health of humans, food supplies and others. Dr. Stamper mentions himself that we are only focusing on calcium molecules in the acidification reactions instead of all the molecules and how they affect the organisms around them. He said changes in the normal calcification can lead to decrease muscle mass and decreased feeding which can harm the vitality of species in the ocean. He suggests gaining more control of our water usage since it generates 3% of our energy produced. In conjunction, he recommends people take personal steps in water conservation and energy conservation by buying energy efficient lights, low-flow toilets or dual-flush toilets, and gaining control of your heating costs by installing a low-energy system.

As a science teacher, I feel that it is important to bring awareness to crucial topics as well as issues that are occurring in the world at this current time. I chose the article Ocean Acidification: Hands-on Experiments to Explore the Cause and Consequences because Ocean Acidification (OA) is an important issue that is affecting oceans around the world.

Ocean acidification has numerous causes, but there are even more effects than there are causes. The many effects have an impact on not only marine animals but humans too. Some of these effects include issues associated with coral reefs, organisms under the sea, and human businesses. This problem that seems to be a simple issue is an important source of loss of sea creatures and income. This is the main reason that we need to control ocean acidification.The effects of ocean acidification both above and below the ocean’s surface are detrimental to the environment.

The topics that the class had discussed for the past month was about environmental changes because of how industrial human beings had become, and how human beings were affecting the earth and its oceans. During the experiment me and my group had to figure out the independent and dependent variables to see what was, and was not going to change during the experiment. Me and my group had concluded that the Independent variable was the concentration of acid in each beaker, Every beaker had a different concentration of acid for different results. My whole group also came to the conclusion that the dependent variables was the shells. Every shell had to be the same size, same type of shell, and at least the same mass. Our class did this lab to teach us how as carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide

A better understood consequence of ocean acidification is the reduction of calcium carbonate precipitation by shells of marine organisms, including commercially valuable shellfish, crustaceans and corals and the change of aragonite and calcite saturation levels (Makarow, et el. 2009). The saturation varies with latitude mostly due to temperature effects, with lowest surface saturation in the Arctic Ocean and the Southern Ocean (Turly, C. & Gattuso, JP 2012); hence these regions will be adversely impacted first.

Ocean acidification is the mean decrease in the pH of the earth oceans. Between 1751 and 2004 ocean pH have decreased from 8.25 to 8.14 (Jacobson 2005). The ocean will absorb nearly a quarter of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere every year. Carbon dioxide in seawater increases the hydrogen ion concentration of the seawater, thus lowering the pH of the seawater. A higher concentration of carbon dioxide will lead to bleaching responses to coral reefs. When coral reefs got bleached will damage marine ecosystem. Coral reefs provide shelter, fish and marine life can raise their offspring to form a complete ecological environment. The pH in ocean acidification is the key factor that led coral reefs to fade out and calcification rate increase rapidly. Because increased acidity of the oceans is the production of shell and skeleton plates

Ocean acidification is the process through which acid is formed due to the burning of fossil fuels in modern industrial society and combined with ocean water. There are unwanted gas like carbon dioxide which are now a days increasing due to human activities emission in to the environment and much of the carbon dioxide is absorbed by the oceans and the combination of carbon dioxide emitted when combined with the ocean water, carbonic acid is formed and this will dissociate to form bicarbonate ions and hydrogen ions reducing the PH of the ocean or changing the ocean water in to acid and this process is called ocean acidification.

The world we live in is so vast and exciting. Seventy percent of our world is liquid water we call the ocean. In the ocean there are many creatures that each are unique in their own way. However, it is possible that in our lifetime, many marine organisms will become endangered or possibly extinct. The loss of these mejestic marine creatures will be caused mainly because of human advancements in which fossil fuels are used to produce energy. Biodiversity is greatly affected by this increase in acidity. As the ocean acidifies, multiple social and economic issues arise. As humans, we rely on the ocean for almost everything. Much of our food, clothing, cleaning products and cosmetics come from the ocean. With the loss of