The microbiologist working to understand how oceans absorb carbon dioxide – Nature

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Zheng is trying to work out whether these microbes could provide an environmentally friendly way to stash away atmospheric carbon that is pumped into the ocean, thereby helping to lessen global warming and mitigate climate change.

Scientists have long known that there is a large amount of carbon stored in the ocean, as much as 50 times more than in the atmosphere .

Our team has since found that marine bacteria consume only certain types of organic matter, including carbon, and leave out other types.

For example, our laboratory experiments found that microorganisms tend to generate less RDOC in water that has large quantities of chemicals and minerals, such as those from chemical fertilizer or sewage.

The field of ocean carbon storage has received a lot of attention, and funding opportunities have been increasing.

Since 2015, many manufacturing and heavy-industry companies have asked us to help them measure how much of the carbon generated by their projects they can trap so they can participate in China’s carbon-trading market — a scheme to incentivize companies to reduce their carbon emissions.

For example, the Lianjiang county government asked us about quantifying how much carbon it could sequester by planting trees along river banks.

The centre was established in December 2020.

It is one of 20 similar centres set up at Chinese universities in the past 2 years or so.

As far as I know, many of them have received support only from their institutions and local authorities.

These centres need to be set up at the universities and institutes that have the best experience and expertise to lead the field.

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