Organic Carbon Burial in Global Continental Margin Sediments

Organic Carbon Burial in Global Continental Margin Sediments | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Physical Sciences - Article Organic Carbon Burial in Global Continental Margin Sediments Sandra Arndt, Dominik Huelse, Markus Diesing, Sarah Paradis, Craig Smeaton This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-8174193/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract Continental margins, situated at the nexus of land and ocean, act as major burial hotspots for terrestrial and marine organic matter, creating a critical interface between the short-term carbon cycle and long-term geological storage. Although this burial largely regulates atmospheric CO₂, O₂ and thus climate, its magnitude and spatial distribution remain poorly constrained due to sparse observations and an extraordinary environmental variability. Here we present the first global, observation-constrained assessment of organic-carbon transfer and burial along the global continental margin, integrating observational data with spatial machine learning and three-dimensional reaction–transport modelling. We estimate a global organic-carbon transfer flux of 367 Tg C yr⁻¹ on centennial timescales, decreasing to 293 and 246 Tg C yr⁻¹ on millennial and multi-millennial scales. These results show that continental-margin sediments form one of Earth’s largest and most persistent long-term carbon sinks, exceeding lakes, reservoirs and all major vegetated coastal ecosystems combined. Burial is strongly heterogeneous, with ~70% occurring in the Northern Hemisphere and ~50% in equatorial regions, and with pronounced hotspots in tropical margins and marginal seas. These findings reduce a central uncertainty in the coastal carbon budget and thus refine global carbon cycle assessments, constrain ocean–atmosphere CO₂ exchange, and provide the first spatial framework to guide marine conservation, management, and climate policy. Earth and environmental sciences/Biogeochemistry/Carbon cycle Earth and environmental sciences/Climate sciences/Biogeochemistry/Carbon cycle Earth and environmental sciences/Ocean sciences/Marine chemistry organic carbon burial continental margins coastal carbon balance blue carbon Full Text Additional Declarations There is NO Competing Interest. Supplementary Files CoastalCarbonBurialSITable.xlsx OC burial fluxes in continental margin sediments CoastalCarbonSI.pdf Supplementary Information Box120260115.pdf Box 1 Cite Share Download PDF Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. Our growing team is made up of researchers and industry professionals working together to solve the most critical problems facing scientific publishing. Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-8174193","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Physical Sciences - Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":575734494,"identity":"bd5dcda4-e636-4f70-a659-1b5f2378dfb9","order_by":0,"name":"Sandra 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Although this burial largely regulates atmospheric CO₂, O₂ and thus climate, its magnitude and spatial distribution remain poorly constrained due to sparse observations and an extraordinary environmental variability. Here we present the first global, observation-constrained assessment of organic-carbon transfer and burial along the global continental margin, integrating observational data with spatial machine learning and three-dimensional reaction–transport modelling. We estimate a global organic-carbon transfer flux of 367 Tg C yr⁻¹ on centennial timescales, decreasing to 293 and 246 Tg C yr⁻¹ on millennial and multi-millennial scales. These results show that continental-margin sediments form one of Earth’s largest and most persistent long-term carbon sinks, exceeding lakes, reservoirs and all major vegetated coastal ecosystems combined. 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