AP BIOLOGY

Detailed explanation-1: -The oceans play a particularly important role in the carbon cycle. Surface waters exchange gases with the atmosphere, absorbing and releasing carbon dioxide, oxygen, and other gases. Plant-like phytoplankton living in the ocean convert carbon dioxide into sugars that feed marine ecosystems.

Detailed explanation-2: -The ocean stores 50 times more carbon than the atmosphere, and 20 times more than land plants and soil combined, Buesseler said.

Detailed explanation-3: -Carbon dioxide is naturally stored in the ocean through chemical processes, either as a dissolved gas or, over a longer time scale, as carbonate sediments on the seafloor. In fact, more than 70 percent of current CO2 emissions will eventually wind-up in the ocean.

Detailed explanation-4: -Plants and animals use oxygen to respire and return it to the air and water as carbon dioxide (CO2). CO2 is then taken up by algae and terrestrial green plants and converted into carbohydrates during the process of photosynthesis, oxygen being a by-product.

Detailed explanation-5: -Carbon Dioxide in the Water Carbon dioxide, also called CO2, is found in water as a dissolved gas. It can dissolve in water 200 times more easily than oxygen.