NERC/NASA Multiple Model Assessment of Biological Influence on Ocean Carbon

Funding through the UK Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for UK-US projects to incorporate new representations of key processes regulating ocean carbon storage in contrasting global models.

The Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) is partnering with National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to deliver the Multiple Model Assessment of Biological Influence on Ocean Carbon call. This is a pre-announcement for the funding opportunity, which is due to open in February 2026.

Funding will be available for UK-US projects to incorporate new representations of key processes regulating ocean carbon storage in contrasting global models. The aim is to deliver the multiple model assessment of biological influence on ocean carbon component of the Biological Influence on Future Ocean Storage of Carbon (BIO-Carbon) research programme, and NASA’s Export Processes in the Ocean from Remote Sensing (EXPORTS) programme.

The ocean stores huge amounts of carbon dioxide that would otherwise be in the atmosphere. Marine organisms play a critical role, but emerging evidence indicates that global coupled ocean atmosphere models are not fully accounting for their impact. BIO-Carbon and EXPORTS will deliver the new understanding of biological processes necessary to push beyond the state-of-the-art, to provide robust predictions of future ocean carbon storage.

Projects are expected to address one or more of the following questions:

• How does marine life affect the potential for seawater to keep taking up CO2, and how will this change?
• How will the rate at which marine life converts dissolved CO2 into organic carbon change?
• How do upper ocean ecosystem characteristics determine the vertical transfer of organic matter from the well-lit surface ocean?
• What controls the efficiency of vertical transfer of organic matter below the well-lit surface ocean?
• How will future shifts in respiration by the marine ecosystem affect the ocean storage of carbon?
• How can the knowledge gained be used to reduce uncertainties in contemporary and future estimates of the export and fates of net primary production?

BIO-Carbon and EXPORTS aim to deliver a fundamental understanding of the key biological processes that are relevant globally. By encapsulating this new knowledge in a robust modelling framework, it will allow examination of the resulting feedback on future predictions for how global ocean carbon storage may change. Additionally, it will provide new parameterisations of key processes for inclusion in the next generation of global models and emergent constraints to identify clearly erroneous forecasts.

Applicants will be expected to build on information produced by the previous BIO-Carbon funding opportunities, the EXPORTS programme and data emerging from other projects internationally. To support this, a workshop will take place in Glasgow in March 2026. The approach taken should include a diverse range of global models to be able to provide a robust assessment of the impact of biologically affected changes in ocean carbon storage to 2100 and its uncertainty.

Applicants are strongly encouraged to be collaborative and include UK and US researchers. One integrated application should be submitted to the UKRI Funding Service detailing both the UK and US contributions to the project in the case of a UK-US collaboration.