Basin Scale pCO 2 Distribution in Case 1 Waters: An Investigation from Bay of Bengal, India

Partial pressure of Carbon Dioxide (pCO 2 ) is an important parameter to determine the air-sea CO 2 fluxes. The sea surface pCO 2 is highly variable, primarily regulated by seasonal Sea Surface Temperature (SST). Bay of Bengal (BoB) remains an underexplored region in terms of air-sea interaction studies. While a few studies have been conducted at the western and northern coast of BoB, pCO 2 estimation in case 1 waters at basin scale has not been carried out so far. The present study aims at developing an empirical relation for the estimation of the pCO 2 using SST and Sea Surface Salinity (SSS) and developing seasonal climatological pCO 2 maps for case 1 waters of BoB using remotely sensed SST and SSS. The results show that pCO 2 is significantly correlated $(\mathrm{R}^{2}=0.8)$ with SST and SSS and more pCO 2 maps can be prepared for seasons to understand the effects of seasonality and physical phenomena.