Horizontal gradient of the chemical speciation of iron in surface waters of the northeast Atlantic Ocean

A transect across the eastern North Atlantic from 42°N, 23°W towards the European continental shelf and English Channel shows a gradient of increasing concentrations of dissolved iron (0.7–1.9 nM), iron-binding ligands and iron(II) across the continental rise. Other data, notably aluminium and manganese, indicate that the increases are part of a front in the metal concentrations, which is due to admixture of bottom waters. Metal fronts in shelf waters are well known, but it was not known that this may include iron(II) and organic iron-complexing ligands. The iron gradient covered a narrow salinity band between 35 and 36, and was linearly related to salinity indicating conservative behaviour, possibly caused by organic complexation keeping the iron in solution. The open ocean iron(II) levels were low but a major proportion of the increased iron levels in the shelf and coastal waters was found to occur as iron(II), and the increase in the overall iron concentration was matched by increased ligand concentrations causing the iron to remain organically complexed. A sedimentary origin for the iron(II) in the surface waters would require iron(II) to be more stable than expected, perhaps through complexation–stabilization.