North American Carbon Program CH. Support long-term quantitative measurements of fluxes, sources, and sinks of atmospheric CO and CH, and develop forecasts for future trends. The North American Carbon Program was designed to help with the process of providing data needed to model the synthesis activities. The carbon cycle is subdivided into two sections, the rapid carbon exchange, and long-term cycling of carbon through the various geological processes. This carbon cycle occurs in our biological processes, including respiration, photosynthesis, and is generated by autotrophs. Autotrophs (usually photosynthetic) are plants or algae, which capture the carbon dioxide from the air. In water, the compounds removed
Carbon dioxide oceans act as an enormous carbon sink, and have taken up about a third of emitted by human activity. As the concentration of carbon dioxide increases in the atmosphere, the increased uptake of carbon dioxide into the oceans is causing a measurable decrease in the pH of the oceans, which is referred to as ocean acidification. This reduction in pH affects biological systems in the oceans, primarily oceanic calcifying organisms. These effects span the food chain from autotrophs to heterotrophs and include organisms such as coccolithophores, corals, foraminifera, echinoderms, crustaceans and mollusks. Under normal conditions, calcium carbonate is stable in