Carbon cycle

The carbon cycle happens on a scale at once so grand, and so tiny that it can not be photographed. A skilled illustrator-storyteller, however can crystalize the info in one handy glance!

Carbon is stored in the atmosphere, vegetation, soil, deep layers of the crust and in surface and deep water. A few of the mechanisms of bringing carbon into the system are plants photosynthesizing, and storms carrying sediment down into the ocean. Decomposition by fungi and bacteria, plants and animals respiring, burning fossil fuels and carbon dioxide dissolving off of the ocean are some of the mechanisms that release carbon back out.

Credit: © Zina Deretsky, National Science Foundation