Marine control of biological production in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean

The eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean is the site of approximately 20–50% of new biological production in the global oceans1. This region is also responsible for the greatest efflux of CO2 from oceans to the atmosphere2. New production, which fixes carbon in response to external inputs of nutrients as opposed to supply from local nutrient recycling, is thought to modulate the CO2 release3. But what controls new production in this region is less clear. Here we present a quantitative reconstruction of biological production in the surface ocean for this region over the past 130,000 years, which shows that the equatorial Pacific Ocean exhibits higher-frequency variations than the South Equatorial Current. Comparison of these records with palaeotemperature reconstructions indicates that atmospherically driven mechanisms—such as aeolian flux of iron or wind-driven changes in upwelling rate of nutrient-rich waters—are unlikely to have influenced longer-term rates of production in this region. Instead, biological production appears to be governed by changes in ocean circulation and the chemical composition of upwelled water.