Xinping Hu, Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi
Among the NOAA designated Large Marine Ecosystems, the Gulf of America (GOA) remains poorly understood in terms of its current ocean acidification conditions, despite its ecological and economic significance. In the northwestern GOA (nwGOA), decadal acidification has been observed in the shelf-slope region, with metabolic production of CO2 contributing to a larger fraction of CO2 accumulation than uptake of anthropogenic CO2, and the observed rate of acidification is significantly greater than that in other tropical and subtropical areas. Unfortunately, whether the observed OA in this region represents a short-term phenomenon or a long-term trend is unknown. It is hypothesized that increasing atmospheric CO2, increasing terrestrial nutrient export due to an enhanced hydrological cycle, and enhanced upwelling due to climate change will cause the continental shelf-slope region in the nwGOA to acidify faster than other tropical and subtropical seas. In order to test this hypothesis wave gliders, in situ sensor along with underway measurements from research vessels will measure carbonated chemistry in in surface and shallow waters. Modeling will be used to integrate the chemical signals into the models to hindcast or predict spatial and temporal variation of the ocean acidification signal for the the optimization of monitoring design and implementation.