The ocean plays a major role in shaping Earth’s climate, regulating levels of key atmospheric trace gases such as carbon dioxide on time scales of decades to millennia. Much progress has been made in understanding the global carbon cycle; quantifying major carbon sources, sinks, and transport pathways; and tracking the fate of anthropogenic carbon released from fossil fuel combustion and deforestation. However, many key questions remain regarding the magnitude and evolution of ocean uptake of anthropogenic carbon and the likely biogeochemical and ecosystem responses and feedbacks to future changes in ocean chemistry and climate.

Benway, H.M., and S.C. Doney. 2014. Scientific outcomes and future challenges of the Ocean Carbon and Biogeochemistry Program. Oceanography 27(1):106–107, https://doi.org/10.5670/oceanog.2014.13.

Church, M.J., M.W. Lomas, and F. Muller-Karger. 2013. Sea change: Charting the course for biogeochemical ocean time-series research in a new millennium. Deep Sea Research Part II 93:2–15, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dsr2.2013.01.035.
1. Benway, H.M., S.P. Cooley, and S.C. Doney. 2010. A Catalyst for Ocean Acidification Research and Collaboration: Ocean Carbon and Biogeochemistry Short Course on Ocean Acidification, Woods Hole, Massachusetts, November 2–13, 2009. Eos, Transactions American Geophysical Union 91(12):112, https://doi.org/10.1029/2010EO120008.
2. Lorenzoni, L., and H.M. Benway, eds. 2013. Report of Global Intercomparability in a Changing Ocean: An International Time-Series Methods Workshop, St. Georges, Bermuda, November 28–30, 2012. Ocean Carbon and Biogeochemistry (OCB) Program and International Ocean Carbon Coordination Project (IOCCP), 60 pp.

This is an open access article made available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution, and reproduction in any medium or format as long as users cite the materials appropriately, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate the changes that were made to the original content. Images, animations, videos, or other third-party material used in articles are included in the Creative Commons license unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If the material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission directly from the license holder to reproduce the material.