Description: Large reservoirs of methane present in Arctic marine sediments are susceptible to rapid warming, promoting increasing methane emissions. Gas bubbles in the water column can be detected, and flow rates can be quantified using hydroacoustic survey methods, making it possible to monitor spatiotemporal variability. We present methane (CH4) bubble flow rates derived from hydroacoustic data sets acquired during 11 research expeditions to the western Svalbard continental margin (2008-2014). Three seepage areas emit in total 725-1,125 t CH4/year, and bubble fluxes are up to 2 kg.m(-2).year (-1). Bubble fluxes vary between different surveys, but no clear trend can be identified. Flux variability analyses suggest that two areas are geologically interconnected, displaying alternating flow changes. Spatial migration of bubble seepage was observed to follow seasonal changes in the theoretical landward limit of the hydrate stability zone, suggesting that formation/dissociation of shallow hydrates, modulated by bottom water temperatures, influences seafloor bubble release. Plain Language Summary It has been speculated that the release of methane (a potent greenhouse gas) from the seafloor in some Arctic Ocean regions is triggered by warming seawater. Emissions of gas bubbles from the seafloor can be detected by ship-mounted sonars. In 2008, a methane seepage area west of Svalbard was hydroacoustically detected for the first time. This seepage was hypothesized to be caused by dissociation of hydrates (ice-like crystals consisting of methane and water) due to ocean warming. We present an analysis of sonar data from 11 surveys conducted between 2008 and 2014. This study is the first comparison of methane seepage-related hydroacoustic data over such a long period. The hydroacoustic mapping and quantification method allowed us to assess the locations and intensity of gas bubble release, and how these parameters change over time, providing necessary data for numerical flux and climate models. No trend of increasing gas flow was identified. However, we observed seasonal variations potentially controlled by seasonal formation and dissociation of shallow hydrates. The hydrate formation/dissociation process is likely controlled by changes of bottom water temperatures. Alternating gas emissions between two neighboring areas indicate the existence of fluid pathway networks within the sediments.

Description: Cenozoic biostratigraphic, cosmogenic isotope, magnetostratigraphic, and cyclostratigraphic data derived from Integrated Ocean Drilling Program Expedition 302, the Arctic Coring Expedition (ACEX), are merged into a coherent age model. This age model has low resolution because of poor core recovery, limited availability of biostratigraphic information, and the complex nature of the magnetostratigraphic record. One 2.2 Ma long hiatus occurs in the late Miocene; another spans 26 Ma (18.2–44.4 Ma). The average sedimentation rate in the recovered Cenozoic sediments is about 15 m/Ma. Core-seismic correlation links the ACEX sediments to the reflection seismic stratigraphy of line AWI-91090, on which the ACEX sites were drilled. This seismostratigraphy can be correlated over wide geographic areas in the central Arctic Ocean, implying that the ACEX age model can be extended well beyond the drill sites.

Description: More than 250 plumes of gas bubbles have been discovered emanating from the seabed of the West Spitsbergen continental margin, in a depth range of 150– 400 m, at and above the present upper limit of the gas hydrate stability zone (GHSZ). Some of the plumes extend upward to within 50 m of the sea surface. The gas is predominantly methane. Warming of the northward-flowing West Spitsbergen current by 1° C over the last thirty years is likely to have increased the release of methane from the seabed by reducing the extent of the GHSZ, causing the liberation of methane from decomposing hydrate. If this process becomes widespread along Arctic contine ntal margins, tens of Teragrams of methane per year could be released into the ocean.

Description: © The Author(s), 2019. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Badger, M. P. S., Chalk, T. B., Foster, G. L., Bown, P. R., Gibbs, S. J., Sexton, P. F., Schmidt, D. N., Paelike, H., Mackensen, A., & Pancost, R. D.. Insensitivity of alkenone carbon isotopes to atmospheric CO2 at low to moderate CO2 levels. Climate of the Past, 15(2), (2019):539-554 doi:10.5194/cp-15-539-2019.

Description: Atmospheric pCO2 is a critical component of the global carbon system and is considered to be the major control of Earth's past, present, and future climate. Accurate and precise reconstructions of its concentration through geological time are therefore crucial to our understanding of the Earth system. Ice core records document pCO2 for the past 800 kyr, but at no point during this interval were CO2 levels higher than today. Interpretation of older pCO2 has been hampered by discrepancies during some time intervals between two of the main ocean-based proxy methods used to reconstruct pCO2: the carbon isotope fractionation that occurs during photosynthesis as recorded by haptophyte biomarkers (alkenones) and the boron isotope composition (δ11B) of foraminifer shells. Here, we present alkenone and δ11B-based pCO2 reconstructions generated from the same samples from the Pliocene and across a Pleistocene glacial–interglacial cycle at Ocean Drilling Program (ODP) Site 999. We find a muted response to pCO2 in the alkenone record compared to contemporaneous ice core and δ11B records, suggesting caution in the interpretation of alkenone-based records at low pCO2 levels. This is possibly caused by the physiology of CO2 uptake in the haptophytes. Our new understanding resolves some of the inconsistencies between the proxies and highlights that caution may be required when interpreting alkenone-based reconstructions of pCO2.

Description: This study used samples provided by the International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP). We thank Alex Hull and Gemma Bowler for laboratory work, Lisa Schönborn and Günter Meyer for technical assistance, Alison Kuhl and Ian Bull for research support, and Andy Milton at the University of Southampton for maintaining some of the mass spectrometers used in this study. This study was funded by NERC grant NE/H006273/1 to Richard D. Pancost, Daniela N. Schmidt and Gavin L. Foster (which supported Marcus P. S. Badger). We also acknowledge the ERC Award T-GRES and a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award to Richard D. Pancost. Gavin L. Foster is also supported by a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award. We thank Kirsty Edgar for comments on an early draft of the manuscript, the two anonymous reviewers of this submission, and reviewers through various rounds of review whose comments greatly improved the manuscript. We are grateful to Thomas Bauska for encouraging us to do better at referencing the ice core data, and John Jasper for discussion of the early days of the alkenone palaeobarometer.