P. S. Liss

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• B.Sc., Ph.D.
• Emeritus Professor at University of East Anglia

Plain Language Summary Ozone in the lower atmosphere is a key air pollutant and a strong greenhouse gas. Deposition to the ocean represents a large removal mechanism for ozone but the processes driving this removal remain poorly understood. The rate of ozone deposition to the ocean is thought to be controlled by its reactions with marine substances...

The Southern Ocean is the primary region for the uptake of anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO2) and is, therefore, crucial for Earth’s climate. However, the Southern Ocean CO2 flux estimates reveal substantial uncertainties and lack direct validation. Using seven independent and directly measured air-sea CO2 flux datasets, we identify a 25% stronger...

Energy policy is one of the central questions on the political agenda. The problems involved in satisfying the world's ever-increasing energy needs have been compounded by the realization that increasing use of fossil fuels may damage the environment and cause irreversible climatic changes. The consumption of electricity is likely to grow because o...

The oceans are a major carbon sink. Sea surface temperature (SST) is a crucial variable in the calculation of the air‐sea carbon dioxide (CO2) flux from surface observations. Any bias in the SST or any upper ocean vertical temperature gradient (e.g., the cool skin effect) potentially generates a bias in the CO2 flux estimates. A recent study sugges...

The discovery of atmospheric micro(nano)plastic transport and ocean–atmosphere exchange points to a highly complex marine plastic cycle, with negative implications for human and ecosystem health. Yet, observations are currently limited. In this Perspective, we quantify the processes and fluxes of the marine-atmospheric micro(nano)plastic cycle, wit...

Air‐sea carbon dioxide (CO2) flux is generally estimated by the bulk method using upper ocean CO2 fugacity measurements. In the summertime Arctic, sea‐ice melt results in stratification within the upper ocean (top ∼10 m), which can bias bulk CO2 flux estimates when the seawater CO2 fugacity is taken from a ship's seawater inlet at ∼6 m depth (fCO2w...

Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are ubiquitous in the atmosphere and are important for atmospheric chemistry. Large uncertainties remain in the role of the ocean in the atmospheric VOC budget because of poorly constrained marine sources and sinks. There are very few direct measurements of air–sea VOC fluxes near the coast, where natural marine em...

Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are ubiquitous in the atmosphere and are important for atmospheric chemistry. Large uncertainties remain in the role of the ocean in the atmospheric VOC budget because of poorly constrained marine sources and sinks. There are very few direct measurements of air–sea VOC fluxes near the coast, where natural marine em...

Understanding the physical and biogeochemical interactions and feedbacks between the ocean and atmosphere is a vital component of environmental and Earth system research. The ability to predict and respond to future environmental change relies on a detailed understanding of these processes. The Surface Ocean-Lower Atmosphere Study (SOLAS) is an int...

Surface ocean biogeochemistry and photochemistry regulate ocean-atmosphere fluxes of trace gases critical for Earth's atmospheric chemistry and climate. The oceanic processes governing these fluxes are often sensitive to the changes in ocean pH (or pCO2) accompanying ocean acidification (OA), with potential for future climate feedbacks. Here, we re...

Microplastics in the atmosphere

Estuaries are dynamic mixing zones where river water interacts with seawater, resulting in large and complex geochemical changes. How two key factors, particle aggregation and pH, affect metal behaviour in estuaries is reviewed and integrated in this paper. Riverine particles are coated with organic matter and electrostatic repulsive forces restric...

To mark the publication of the special collection in honor of Robert (Bob) A. Duce in the Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, we have summarized his most important contributions to the subject of biogeochemical coupling between the atmosphere and ocean. Here we have divided these contributions into four themes—deposition from the atmosphere and it...

Despite the huge extent of the ocean's surface, until now relatively little attention has been paid to the sea surface microlayer (SML) as the ultimate interface where heat, momentum and mass exchange between the ocean and the atmosphere takes place. Via the SML, large-scale environmental changes in the ocean such as warming, acidification, deoxyge...

We report a new synthesis of best estimates of the inputs of fixed nitrogen to the world ocean via atmospheric deposition, and compare this to fluvial inputs and di-nitrogen fixation. We evaluate the scale of human perturbation of these fluxes. Fluvial inputs dominate inputs to the continental shelf, and we estimate about 75% of this fluvial nitrog...

Significance Exceedingly high levels of fine particulate matter (PM) occur frequently in China, but the mechanism of severe haze formation remains unclear. From atmospheric measurements in two Chinese megacities and laboratory experiments, we show that the oxidation of SO 2 by NO 2 occurs efficiently in aqueous media under two polluted conditions:...

The Baltic Sea is a unique environment as the largest body of brackish water in the world. Acidification of the surface oceans due to absorption of anthropogenic CO2 emissions is an additional stressor facing the pelagic community of the already challenging Baltic Sea. To investigate its impact on trace gas biogeochemistry, a largescale mesocosm ex...

The Baltic Sea is a unique environment as the largest body of brackish water in the world. Acidification of the surface oceans due to absorption of anthropogenic CO2 emissions is an additional stressor facing the pelagic community of the already challenging Baltic Sea. To investigate its impact on trace gas biogeochemistry, a large-scale mesocosm e...

Ambitious response needed on climate front Letter to the Times – 16 th Dec 2015 Sir, The agreement reached in Paris shows there is now impressive global ambition to tackle climate change – with tough challenges ahead (Britain facing steeper emissions cuts; Dec 14). Further policy action is urgently required to transform ambition into reality. Unfor...

The development of earth System Science has been inseparable in many ways from IGBP's scientific and institutional evolution.

Environmental context Approximately 25 % of CO2 released to the atmosphere by human activities has been absorbed by the oceans, resulting in ocean acidification. We investigate the acidification effects on marine phytoplankton and subsequent production of the trace gas dimethylsulfide, a major route for sulfur transfer from the oceans to the atmosp...

Short-lived halocarbons were measured in Arctic sea-ice brine, seawater and air above the Greenland and Norwegian seas (∼81°N, 2 to 5°E) in mid-summer, from a melting ice floe at the edge of the ice pack. In the ice floe, concentrations of C2H5I, 2-C3H7I and CH2Br2 showed significant enhancement in the sea ice brine, of average factors of 1.7, 1.4...

We present air–sea fluxes of oxygenated volatile organics compounds (OVOCs) quantified by eddy covariance (EC) during the Atlantic Meridional Transect cruise in 2012. Measurements of acetone, acetaldehyde, and methanol in air as well as in water were made in several different oceanic provinces and over a wide range of wind speeds (1–18 m s−1). The...

Why a chapter on Perspectives and Integration in SOLAS Science in this book? SOLAS science by its nature deals with interactions that occur: across a wide spectrum of time and space scales, involve gases and particles, between the ocean and the atmosphere, across many disciplines including chemistry, biology, optics, physics, mathematics, computing...

The two-way exchange of trace gases between the ocean and the atmosphere is important for both the chemistry and physics of the atmosphere and the biogeochemistry of the oceans, including the global cycling of elements. Here we review these exchanges and their importance for a range of gases whose lifetimes are generally short compared to the main...

The impacts of anthropogenic nitrogen (N) deposition on the marine N cycle are only now being revealed, but the magnitudes of those impacts are largely unknown in time and space. The South China Sea (SCS) is particularly subject to high anthropogenic N deposition because the adjacent countries are highly populated and have rapidly growing economies...

We present air-sea fluxes of oxygenated volatile organics compounds (OVOCs) quantified by eddy covariance during the Atlantic Meridional Transect cruise in 2012. Measurements of acetone, acetaldehyde, and methanol were made in several different oceanic provinces and over a wide range of wind speeds of 1-18 m s-1. The ocean appears to be a sink for...

Seawater acidification can be induced both by absorption of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO₂) and by atmospheric deposition of sulfur and nitrogen oxides and ammonia. Their relative significance, interplay and dependency on water-column biogeochemistry are not well understood. Using a simple biogeochemical model we show that the initial c...

The oceans and atmosphere interact through various processes, including the transfer of momentum, heat, gases and particles. In this book leading international experts come together to provide a state-of-the-art account of these exchanges and their role in the Earth-system, with particular focus on gases and particles. Chapters in the book cover: i...

Significance Transport of gases between the ocean and the atmosphere has profound implications for our environment and the Earth’s climate. An example of this transport is the oceanic uptake of carbon dioxide, which has buffered us from a higher concentration of this greenhouse gas in the atmosphere while also causing ocean acidification. Here we d...

Many of the reactive trace gases detected in the atmosphere are both emitted from and deposited to the global oceans via exchange across the air-sea interface. The resistance to transfer through both air and water phases is highly sensitive to physical drivers (waves, bubbles, films, etc.), which can either enhance or suppress the rate of diffusion...

Oceanic methanol, acetaldehyde, and acetone concentrations were measured during an Atlantic Meridional Transect (AMT) cruise from the UK to Chile (49°N to 39°S) in 2009. Methanol (48–361 nM) and acetone (2–24 nM) varied over the track with enrichment in the oligotrophic Northern Atlantic Gyre. Acetaldehyde showed less variability (3–9 nM) over the...

Environmental Fenton chemistry has been poorly constrained within the marine environment at a multi-component level. A simple, unique, reconfiguration of a flow-injection analytical system combined with luminol chemiluminescence allows quasi-simultaneously the measurement, using a single load-inject valve and a single photon multiplier tube, of red...

Volatile halogenated organic compounds containing bromine and iodine, which are naturally produced in the ocean, are involved in ozone depletion in both the troposphere and stratosphere. Three prominent compounds transporting large amounts of marine halogens into the atmosphere are bromoform (CHBr3), dibromomethane (CH2Br2) and methyl iodide (CH3I)...

The marine environment is known to be a source of CHBr3 and CH2Br2 and hence ozone-depleting inorganic bromine to the troposphere but, to date, the dominant processes controlling their concentrations in seawater remain poorly understood. Here results are reported from a series of laboratory experiments designed to investigate bromocarbon dynamics i...

Dimethylsulfide (DMS) is a gas produced biologically in the oceans. When re - leased across the air-sea interface, it plays several important roles in the atmosphere, including affecting the acidity of rain and other forms of precipitation and the formation of cloud condensation nuclei (CCN). In this chapter, we review aspects of the cycle of DMS i...

Volatile halogenated organic compounds containing bromine and iodine, which are naturally produced in the ocean, are involved in ozone depletion in both the troposphere and stratosphere. Three prominent compounds transporting large amounts of marine halogens into the atmosphere are bromoform (CHBr₃), dibromomethane (CH₂Br<sub>...

Megacities are not only important drivers for socio-economic development but also sources of environmental challenges. Many megacities and large urban agglomerations are located in the coastal zone where land, atmosphere, and ocean meet, posing multiple environmental challenges which we consider here. The atmospheric flow around megacities is compl...

This paper reviews our knowledge of the measurement and modeling of mineral dust emissions to the atmosphere, its transport and deposition to the ocean, the release of iron from the dust into seawater, and the possible impact of that nutrient on marine biogeochemistry and climate. Of particular concern is our poor understanding of the mechanisms an...

Climate change and human activities are expected to have a major impact on the structure and functioning of marine ecosystems and the biogeochemical cycles they mediate in the coming years. Here we describe time series measurements of biogenic bromocarbons (CHBr3 and CH2Br2) collected in coastal waters of the western Antarctic Peninsula which is on...

The global tropospheric budget of gaseous and particulate non-methane organic matter (OM) is re-examined to provide a holistic view of the role that OM plays in transporting the essential nutrients nitrogen and phosphorus to the ocean. A global 3-dimensional chemistry-transport model was used to construct the first global picture of atmospheric tra...

Environmental context As atmospheric CO2 levels rise due to human activities, more of the gas dissolves in the oceans, increasing their acidity. The effect of these seawater changes on marine organisms is largely unknown. We examine the consequences of higher CO2 levels on the production by plankton of dimethyl sulfide, a climatically active gas. W...

Iodine compounds were measured above, below and within the sea ice of the Weddell Sea during a cruise in 2009, to make progress in elucidating the mechanism of local enhancement and volatilisation of iodine. I2 mixing ratios of up to 12.4 pptv were measured 10 m above the sea ice, and up to 31 pptv was observed above surface snow on the nearby Brun...

Iodine compounds were measured above, below and within the sea ice of the Weddell Sea during a cruise in 2009, to elucidate the mechanism of local enhancement and volatilisation of iodine. I₂ mixing ratios of up to 12.4 pptv were measured 10 m above the sea ice, and up to 31 pptv was observed above surface snow on the nearby Brunt Ice Sh...

Megacities have long been recognised as important drivers for socioeconomic development but also as sources of environmental challenges. A large number of megacities are located in the coastal zone where land, atmosphere and ocean meet, posing additional challenges for our understanding of the interactions. The atmospheric flow is complicated not o...

Geoengineering methods are intended to reduce climate change, which is already having demonstrable effects on ecosystem structure and functioning in some regions. Two types of geoengineering activities that have been proposed are: carbon dioxide (CO(2)) removal (CDR), which removes CO(2) from the atmosphere, and solar radiation management (SRM, or...

The deposition of ozone to seawater is known to be controlled by a variety of physical and chemical processes. At low wind speeds chemical loss is comparatively more important than loss due to physical processes. We have determined experimentally the relationship between ozone deposition velocity and concentration of iodide and dissolved organic ma...

Using results obtained from experimental studies of the atmospheric transport of sensible heat, water vapour and momentum over the sea, deposition velocities of soluble and reactive trace gases are evaluated. The deposition velocities that result vary with the height of observation; they are nearly linearly dependent upon wind speed and are a funct...

Even since the CLAW hypothesis was published almost a quarter of a century ago there have been several attempts to find field evidence for the link between biological activity in ocean surface waters and cloud properties, such as particle size, albedo and precipitation. Where such linkage has been found it has been done using remote sensing imagery...

The role of the ocean in the cycling of oxygenated volatile organic compounds (OVOCs) remains largely unanswered due to a paucity of datasets. We describe the method development of a membrane inlet-proton transfer reaction/mass spectrometer (MI-PTR/MS) as an efficient method of analysing methanol, acetaldehyde and acetone in seawater. Validation of...

The acidification of the ocean by anthropogenic CO2 absorbed from the atmosphere is now well-recognized and is considered to have lowered surface ocean pH by 0.1 since the mid-18th century. Future acidification may lead to undersaturation of CaCO3 making growth of calcifying organisms difficult. However, other anthropogenic gases also have the pote...

What do we need to know about greenhouse gases? Over the next 20 years, how should scientists study the role of greenhouse gases in the Earth system and the changes that are taking place? These questions were addressed at a Royal Society scientific Discussion Meeting in London on 22-23 February 2010, with over 300 participants.

The potentially significant role of the biogenic trace gas dimethylsulfide (DMS) in determining the Earth's radiation budget makes it necessary to accurately reproduce seawater DMS distribution and quantify its global flux across the sea/air interface. Following a threefold increase of data (from 15,000 to over 47,000) in the global surface ocean D...

The title of this paper alludes to the oft-repeated statement by ex-U.S. Defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld, considering 'known knowns' (KKs), 'known unknowns' (KUs) and 'unknown unknowns' (UUs); a qualitative analysis which we apply to classify the degree of knowledge about uncertainties in air-sea gas exchange. We have tried to be comprehensive in...

The role of the ocean in the cycling of ethanol and propanol remains unanswered due to a total lack of data on their concentrations in seawater. We report the first measurements of these low molecular mass alcohols made during two field experiments in the Atlantic Ocean. Ethanol concentrations ranged from 2–33 nM. Our analytical technique allowed t...

The interaction of ozone in the atmosphere-ocean system is a topic of central importance to SOLAS science. It is known that the rate of deposition of atmospheric ozone to the sea surface is considerably enhanced by its reaction with components in seawater. We present results of laboratory experiments which show that iodide ions (I-)and organic mate...

The McAuliffe (1971) multiple equilibration technique has been used to measure the Henry's Law constants (H) for a variety of low molecular weight halocarbon gases in distilled and sea waters at a number of temperatures. The following equations are best-fit lines from van't Hoff plots of the results: Freon-11, In H = −2652/T + 10.50 (seawater) and...

The oceanic uptake of man-made CO(2) emissions is resulting in a measureable decrease in the pH of the surface oceans, a process which is predicted to have severe consequences for marine biological and biogeochemical processes [Caldeira K, Wickett ME (2003) Nature 425:365; The Royal Society (2005) Policy Document 12/05 (Royal Society, London)]. Her...

Sea-to-air emissions of bromocarbon gases are known to play an important role in atmospheric ozone depletion. In this study, seawater concentrations of bromoform (CHBr3) and dibromomethane (CH2Br2) were measured regularly between February 2005 and March 2007 at the Rothera Oceanographic and Biological Time Series (RaTS) site located in Marguerite B...

SOLAS is an international programme directed at understanding the exchanges of climate-relevant gases and particles across the air-sea interface. To properly assess the global significance of such processes, it is essential to holistically evaluate and interpret all available data, using such information to generate flux datasets and climatologies....

This article was submitted without an abstract, please refer to the full-text PDF file.

Volatile organoiodine compounds (VOIs) are the main carrier of iodine from the oceans to the atmosphere. We have identified a novel, sea-surface source of the short-lived VOIs CH2I2, CHClI2 and CHI3 in a series of laboratory experiments. These compounds were formed when seawater, collected during winter in the North Sea, was exposed to ambient leve...

A complex cocktail of gases exchange between the atmosphere and oceans and many of the trace gases produced in seawater are considered to play important roles in climate and atmospheric chemistry. The strength of the biogenic marine source depends on a large number of factors that can be categorised as the magnitude of the net formation processes (...

An understanding of the exchange of gases across the air-sea interface and the deposition of atmospheric particles to the sea surface is necessary if we are to improve existing understanding of the processes involved in climate-regulation. To fully assess the significance of such processes at a global level, it is necessary to evaluate and interpre...

The first generation of open-ocean iron enrichments (1993 to 2005) have all had broadly the same design. Enrichment of patches of ocean was typically on a 10 km length-scale, and experi- ments were of a duration of weeks. These scales were dictated by what could conveniently be achieved from research vessels, using tracers to track Lagrangian patch...

Increasing quantities of atmospheric anthropogenic fixed nitrogen entering the open ocean could account for up to about a third of the ocean's external (nonrecycled) nitrogen supply and up to ∼3% of the annual new marine biological production, ∼0.3 petagram of carbon per year. This input could account for the production of up to ∼1.6 teragrams of n...

We report the results of an experiment in the Northeast Atlantic in which sulphur hexafluoride (SF6) was released within an eddy and the behaviour of trace gases, nutrients and productivity followed within a Lagrangian framework over a period of 24 days. Measurements were also made in the air above the eddy in order to estimate air–sea exchange rat...

The potential impact of seawater acidification on the concentrations of dimethylsulfide (DMS) and dimethylsulfoniopropionate (DMSP), and the activity of the enzyme DMSP-lyase was investigated during a pelagic ecosystem CO2 enrichment experiment (PeECE III) in spring 2005. Natural phytoplankton blooms were studied for 24 days under present, double a...

Simultaneous measurements of NH3 in the atmosphere and NH4+ in the ocean are presented from fieldwork spanning 10 years and 110 degrees of latitude, including the first such simultaneous measurements in the remote marine environment at >55°N. At high latitudes, fluxes were almost exclusively from air to sea, in contradiction with previous lower-lat...

We present the first reported measurements of volatile iodocarbon production by biogenic marine aggregates. Iodomethane (CH₃I), iodoethane (C₂H₅I), 2- iodopropane (CH₃CHICH₃), and 1-iodopropane (CH₃CH₂CH₂I) concentrations were determined in incubations of aggregates formed by concentrating the >53 µm fraction of the plankton during a field campaign...

We present the first reported measurements of volatile iodocarbon production by biogenic marine aggregates. Iodomethane (CH3I), iodoethane (C2H5I), 2- iodopropane (CH3CHICH3), and 1-iodopropane (CH3CH2CH2I) concentrations were determined in incubations of aggregates formed by concentrating the .53 mm fraction of the plankton during a field campaign...

We report the results of an experiment in the Northeast Atlantic in which sulphur hexafluoride (SF6) was released within an eddy and the behaviour of trace gases, nutrients and productivity followed within a Lagrangian framework over a period of 24 days. Measurements were also made in the air above the eddy in order to estimate air–sea exchange rat...

Author Posting. © American Geophysical Union, 2008. This article is posted here by permission of American Geophysical Union for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Geophysical Research Letters 35 (2008): L06603, doi:10.1029/2007GL031847. This study, conducted in December 2004, is the first to present observ...

Environmental Context. The alkyl nitrates are a group of organic compounds that are known to be produced naturally in seawater. The sea-to-air flux of alkyl nitrates is believed to contribute significantly to the ‘odd nitrogen’ reservoir of the atmosphere and to play an important role in regulating tropospheric ozone levels in remote marine regions...

The contemporary atmosphere was created as a result of biological activity some two billion years ago. To this day, its natural composition is supported and modified, mostly through biological processes of trace gas production and destruction, while also involving physical and chemical degradation processes. The biosphere has a major influence on p...

We report the results of an experiment in the Northeast Atlantic in which sulphur hexafluoride (SF 6) was released within an eddy and the behaviour of trace gases, nutrients and productivity followed within a Lagrangian framework over a period of 24 days. Measurements were also made in the air above the eddy in order to estimate air–sea exchange ra...

We compare dissolved dimethyl sulphide (DMS) measurements made by our independent laboratories during a mesocosm study of marine phytoplankton under different CO 2 regimes in a Norwegian fjord. Sample preparation and analyses were conducted using headspace solid-phase microextraction (SPME) with gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (Max-Planck Inst...

The potential impact of seawater acidification on the concentrations of dimethylsulfide (DMS) and dimethylsulfoniopropionate (DMSP), and the activity of the enzyme DMSP-lyase was investigated during a pelagic ecosystem CO2 enrichment experiment (PeECE III) in spring 2005. Natural phytoplankton blooms were studied for 24 days under present, double a...

We compare dissolved dimethyl sulphide (DMS) measurements made by our independent laboratories during a mesocosm study of marine phytoplankton under different CO2 regimes in a Norwegian fjord. Sample preparation and analyses were conducted using headspace solid-phase microextraction (SPME) with gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (Max-Planck Insti...

Environmental context. The idea that gases produced by plankton living in the oceans can affect cloudiness and regulate climate was given prominence by the promulgation more than 20 years ago by Charlson, Lovelock, Andreae and Warren of the CLAW hypothesis. In the intervening period it has been difficult to prove or disprove the idea, although much...

Environmental context. Quantifying ammonia concentrations in natural waters is important for our understanding of environmental processes that relate, in particular, to aquaculture toxicity and to the transfer of gaseous ammonia into the atmosphere where it plays a role in new particle formation and climate regulation. The proportion of ammonia pre...

A wide variety of trace gases (e.g. dimethyl sulphide, organohalogens, ammonia, non-methane and oxygenated hydrocarbons, volatile oxygenated organics and nitrous oxide) are formed in marine waters by biological and photochemical processes. This leads in many, but not all, cases to supersaturation of the water relative to marine air concentrations a...

Ammonium (NH4+) concentration was measured at 15 stations in the NE Atlantic during the declining phase of the spring diatom bloom as part of the FISHES 2001 cruise. The NE Atlantic temperate spring bloom is one of the largest seasonal events in the oceanic cycle of primary productivity and represents the conversion of large amounts of oxidized nit...