Particulate organic carbon export fluxes and size-fractionated POC/234Th ratios in the Ligurian, Tyrrhenian and Aegean Seas

Measurements of 234Th/238U disequilibria and particle size-fractionated (1, 10, 20, 53, 70, 100 μm) organic C and 234Th were made to constrain estimates of the export flux of particulate organic C (POC) from the surface waters of the Ligurian, Tyrrhenian and Aegean Seas in March–June 2004. POC exported from the surface waters (75–100 m depth) averaged 9.2 mmol m−2 d−1 in the Ligurian and Tyrrhenian Seas (2.3±0.5–14.9±3.0 mmol m−2 d−1) and 0.9 mmol m−2 d−1 in the Aegean Sea. These results are comparable to previous measurements of 234Th-derived and sediment-trap POC fluxes from the upper 200 m in the Mediterranean Sea. Depth variations in the POC/234Th ratio suggest two possible controls. First, decreasing POC/234Th ratios with depth were attributed to preferential remineralization of organic C. Second, the occurrence of maxima or minima in the POC/234Th ratio near the DCM suggests influence by phytoplankton dynamics. To assess the accuracy of these data, the empirical 234Th-method was evaluated by quantifying the extent to which the 234Th-based estimate of POC flux, PPOC, deviates from the true flux, FPOC, defined as the p-ratio (p-ratio=PPOC/FPOC=STh/SPOC, where S=particle sinking rate). Estimates of the p-ratio made using Stokes’ Law and the particle size distributions of organic C and 234Th yield values ranging from 0.93–1.45. The proximity of the p-ratio to unity implies that differences in the sinking rates of POC- and 234Th-carrying particles did not bias 234Th-normalized POC fluxes by more than a factor of two.