Can Marine Life Survive More Acid Oceans?
Pacific Northwest sea urchins thrive in more acidic waters, suggesting some animals may be able to evolve to meet changing ocean chemistry…to a point. Ed Bowlby, NOAA/Olympic Coast NMS; NOAA/OAR/Office of Ocean Exploration Can sea life evolve fast enough to cope with changing ocean chemistry? That's the question researchers like Gretchen Hofmann are trying to answer. The marine biologist is applying her years of experience with sea urchins to determining how marine animals might evolve or adapt to ocean acidification: the lowering of the ocean's pH due to human-propelled fossil fuel emissions. Her research is at the center of "Sea Change: Can sea life adapt?", the latest in a series of articles on ocean acidification, published last week in The Seattle Times. Hofmann, a scientist at University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), was inspired to begin the research by a commercial urchin...