Sea ice-induced cold air advection as a mechanism controlling tundra primary productivity

Abstract:

The recent sharp decline in Arctic sea ice extent, concentration, and volume leaves urgent questions regarding its effects on ecological processes. Changes in tundra productivity have been associated with sea ice dynamics on the basis that most tundra ecosystems lay close to the sea. Although some studies have addressed the potential effect of sea ice decline on the primary productivity of terrestrial arctic ecosystems (Bhatt et al., 2010), a clear picture of the mechanisms and patterns linking both processes remains elusive.

We hypothesised that sea ice might influence tundra productivity through 1) cold air advection during the growing season (direct/weather effect) or 2) changes in regional climate induced by changes in sea ice (indirect/climate effect). We present a test on the direct/weather effect hypothesis: that is, tundra productivity is coupled with sea ice when sea ice remains close enough from land vegetation during the growing season for cold air advection to limit temperatures locally.

We employed weekly MODIS-derived Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (as a proxy for primary productivity) and sea ice data at a spatial resolution of 232m for the period 2000-2014 (included), covering the Svalbard Archipelago. Our results suggest that sea ice-induced cold air advection is a likely mechanism to explain patterns of NDVI trends and heterogeneous spatial dynamics in the Svalbard archipelago. The mechanism offers the potential to explain sea ice/tundra productivity dynamics in other Arctic areas.