BOSTON, Massachusetts, February 19, 2008 (ENS) - Climate change is transforming the world's oceans by increasing the temperature and acidity of seawater, and altering atmospheric and oceanic circulation, reported a panel of scientists this week at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, AAAS, annual meeting in Boston.

"The vastness of our oceans may have engendered a sense of complacency about potential impacts from global climate change," said Dr. Jane Lubchenco, a marine biologist at Oregon State University, who moderated the panel. "The world's oceans are undergoing profound physical, chemical and biological changes whose impacts are just beginning to be felt."


Panelist Gretchen Hofmann, a molecular physiologist at the University of California-Santa Barbara, describes the situation as "multiple jeopardy."

"Ocean ecosystems are facing new stresses and new combinations of stress," Hofmann said. "The water is warmer, circulation patterns are changing in unpredictable ways, and oceans are becoming acidic."