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Those changes can pull carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and store it deep in the ocean, revealing a powerful natural process that can shape the climate over millions of years.<\/p>\n
Reading Earth\u2019s hidden record<\/p>\n
Ash-rich sediments and fossil records across the Southern Ocean margins preserve a tightly aligned record of volcanic pulses, algal blooms, and sweeping marine change.<\/p>\n
By tracing those signals through geological deposits, Mark Clementz at the University of Wyoming<\/a> connected repeated Andean eruptions directly to shifts in ocean productivity and atmospheric carbon.<\/p>\n The same interval shows rising algal abundance and declining carbon dioxide levels occurring alongside each major phase of volcanic activity<\/a>.<\/p>\n That alignment points to a sustained ocean response rather than isolated events, setting up the need to explain how ash could repeatedly drive such large-scale biological and climate effects.<\/p>\n When ash feeds the sea<\/p>\n Explosive eruptions sent ash carrying iron, phosphorus, and silicon into waters around Antarctica, where even small shortages can hold back huge amounts of growth.<\/p>\n Iron, phosphorus, and silicon especially favor diatoms, tiny algae<\/a> with glassy shells that drive about one-fifth of global primary production.<\/p>\n Classic experiments showed that extra iron can trigger blooms in the Southern Ocean waters when other nutrients are already present.<\/p>\n More growth at the ocean\u2019s base meant more food above it, setting up the larger ecological changes preserved in fossils.<\/p>\n From surface to deep ocean<\/p>\n As algal blooms expanded, more carbon moved out of surface waters and into the dark ocean below.<\/p>\n