Coral polyp-scale modeling for elucidating vital effect of coral skeletal record

2016 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26610167
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Stratigraphy/Paleontology
• Research Institution: Tokyo Institute of Technology
• Principal Investigator: Nakamura Takashi 東京工業大学, 環境・社会理工学院, 講師 (20513641)
• Project Period (FY): 2014-04-01 – 2017-03-31
• Keywords: サンゴ / 炭素同位体比 / vital effect / モデリング / 数値シミュレーション

Outline of Final Research Achievements

To elucidate the ‘vital effect’ of carbon stable isotope recorded in coral skeleton, carbon isotope module for incorporating to the coral polyp model which was already developed by Nakamura et al. (2013) was developed. The results of this model simulation were suggested that the vital effect of the carbon isotope is occurred by that the CO2 derived f. rom coral respiration was used calcification. Moreover similar annual patterns of δ13C in coral skeleton were reproduced by this model. This annual patterns are caused mainly by annual fluctuation of δ13C values in the coral tissue which are occurred by photosynthetic activity related to annual variation of the solar irradiance.

Free Research Field

生態系モデリング、沿岸生態学