Bio-availability of iron derived from subarctic first-year sea ice

Sea ice contains high concentrations of iron (Fe), and melting of sea ice is one of the possible processes that supplies Fe to surface waters (e.g., Lannuzel et al., 2007). To assess the biological availability (bio-availability) of Fe in sea ice, a shipboard bottle incubation experiment (Exp. I) was conducted with surface water from the western subarctic North Pacific and Fe derived from sea ice collected from the Sea of Okhotsk, as compared to Fe derived from inorganic Fe (FeCl3). Addition of FeCl3 solution stimulated the growth of phytoplankton relative to a control treatment. Addition of sea ice meltwater enhanced the particulate labile Fe (> 0.22 μm) by 112 nM and 0.26 nM of dissolved Fe (< 0.22 μm) in the incubated seawater and allowed the phytoplankton to grow, especially large (> 10 μm) phytoplankton, at their maximum growth rate in the incubated seawater. In contrast, addition of desferrioxamine B (DFB) plus sea ice meltwater, in which the strong ligand DFB reduced the bio-availability of Fe, significantly depressed the growth of the large and small (0.8-10 μm) phytoplankton relative to the control. These results clearly demonstrated that Fe stored in the sea ice stimulates growth of the phytoplankton. We carried out another shipboard bottle incubation experiment (Exp. II) to determine the relationship between concentrations of Fe and phytoplankton growth rates by adding FeCl3 solution at a series of concentrations to the seawater. The results indicated that the amount of dissolved Fe that the incubation bottles received from addition of the sea ice meltwater in Exp. I was insufficient to saturate the growth rate of the large phytoplankton. Therefore, the maximum growth rate achieved by the large phytoplankton can be accounted for by the use of the particulate labile Fe released from the sea ice meltwater. These results indicate that Fe stored in sea ice (mainly in particulate form) is bio-available and can contribute to phytoplankton growth when it is released into surface waters in the spring.