If you ’re already getting nightmares from the picture scientists are painting of the futurity blighted by heatwaves and rising ocean , now might be the metre to look forth . The latest scenario is unlikely , but involves a worst case that is even worse than we imagined . If C emissions are permit to run unchecked there is a possibility that the major planet ’s master root of oxygen could grind to a halt , suffocating even those animals – humans included – high enough not to be drowned by ascend seas .
" spheric heating has been a focal point of attention of scientific discipline and political sympathies for about two decades now , " said ProfessorSergei Petrovskiiof the University of Leicester ina command . " A lot has been said about its expected disastrous consequence ; perhaps the most notorious is the world-wide implosion therapy that may result from melt of Antarctic ice if the warming exceeds a few degrees compared to the pre - industrial storey . However , it now appears that this is probably not the biggest peril that the warming can cause to the humanity [ sic ] . "
He continued : " About two - third of the planet ’s full atmospheric oxygen is produced by ocean phytoplankton – and therefore cessation would ensue in the depletion of atmospheric oxygen on a global scale . This would probably result in the mass mortality of animate being and humans . "
Petrovskii modeled what would materialize if sea temperatures increase too rapidly for plankton communities to adapt . The model indicated that under extreme conditions oceanic ecosystems can undergo dramatic shifts , pass to monumental die - offs and depletion of O from the upper ocean , and eventually the aura . This could happen if phytoplankton level got too low , or unsustainably high , either of which could occur with rising temperature .
" The rate of O productiondepends onwater temperature and hence can be affect by the global warming , " Petrovskii wrote in theBulletin of Mathematical Biology .
The modeling is preliminary , with the paper noting that it " leave many features of real marine ecosystems out of the scope . " The personal effects did not go up until temperature exceeded pre - industrial levels by 5 to 6 ° C ( 9 to 10 ° F ) . This is just beyond the upper conclusion ofpredictionsfor 2100 , if we make no serious efforts to cut back on the nursery gasses we emit , and well beyond what is likely if the most polluting technologies are phase out . Moreover , any scenario that brought Earth near to such a large increase in such a myopic meter would have such annihilating moment for beau monde that emission would in all probability retard .
" A decrease in the oxygen concentration below a sure stratum can result in hypoxia and mass fatality rate of nautical animal because of suffocation , " the paper states . " Moreover , this is an matter of of the essence importance … for terrestrial ecosystems on the global shell . "
The fact that such a scenario is even faintly potential bespeak the extent to which we are messing with the planet ’s biography living systems through unchecked emissions .
