The amount of carbon dioxide in the earth's atmosphere is
increasing, mainly because of the burning of fossil fuels and
deforestation, according to the World Meteorological
Organization. That means that the planet's oceans, natural
carbon storage facilities, are absorbing more and more of the
gas, which makes them more acidic. That in turn makes them
increasingly hostile environments for the snails. "Although the
upwelling sites are natural phenomena that occur throughout the
Southern Ocean, instances where they bring the 'saturation
horizon' above 200m will become more frequent as ocean
acidification intensifies in the coming years," said Geraint
Tarling, another of the study's authors. The corrosion of the
sea butterflies shells doesn't necessarily kill them outright,
according to Tarling, who works at the British Antarctic Survey,
a polar scientific research body. "However it may increase their
vulnerability to predation and infection consequently having an
impact to other parts of the food web," he said.