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hatching of oysters at low tide was linked to relatively high
temperatures (higher than 20°C) and a low pH. The hatching took
place at high tide at a similar temperature, but with a much higher pH
(7.8 or higher). He concluded that the most important factors affecting
the hatching of oysters were “the temperature of the water, the
amplitude of the tide, and the concentration in hydrogen ions”.
As interesting and innovative as these works were at the time, they
are not particularly helpful in determining the future impact of ocean
acidification. The chemistry of seawater was measured in an
incomplete and approximate manner, and the pH values that were
used are often extremely low. It is, however, very interesting to note
that the research questions, which are currently a priority (e.g.
multifactorial perturbation experiments, studies of acclimation and
adaptation), had occasionally been studied a few decades ago.
We can consider that modern research began with the founding
article of Revelle and Suess [REV 57], which showed that the
absorption of anthropogenic CO 2 decreases the buffering capacity of
seawater. Broecker and Takahashi [BRO 66] were the first to suggest
that the concentration in
CO could control community calcification.
This has been confirmed for coral reefs [SMI 74] by using mesocosms
(e.g. [LAN 00, LEC 00]).
3
Brewer [BRE 78] gave the first direct proof that the increase in
atmospheric CO 2 led to an increase of partial pressure of CO 2 (pCO 2 )
of Antarctic intermediate waters.
Recent changes in the carbonate chemistry have been confirmed
due to oceanic time-series in the Northwest Atlantic [BAT 01],
Northeast Atlantic [SAN 07], North Pacific [DOR 09] and in the
Iceland Sea [OLA 09].
The first important studies using paleoceanographic tracers are
those of Spivack et al. [SPI 93], who used the isotopic composition of
boron, those of Barker and Elderfield [BAR 02] who used the size-
normalized weight of the tests of foraminifera and Yu et al. [YU 07]
who proposed the use of the boron/calcium ratio to evaluate the past
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