Latest Planktology Stories

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Geoengineering is a controversial and illegal practice that attempts to mitigate the forces of climate change on a grand scale. Many see this attempt to alter global climate via artificial means as a ‘quick fix’ with potential long-term negative effects. However, despite the contentious nature of geoengineering, scientists from the Alfred Wegener Institute in Bremerhaven, Germany decided to analyze a ‘rock dissolving’...

National Science Foundation New research shows that ocean turbulence directly affects the ability of microscopic marine organisms to recycle organic material back into the food web. Results of the study are published in this week's issue of the journal Science. Scientists John Taylor of Cambridge University and Roman Stocker at MIT found that there's a relationship between the natural movement of water in the ocean and the ability of marine bacteria to act as recyclers. "The...

Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Phytoplankton (plant wanderers), organisms that exist in the sunlit layer of the world’s oceans, are important for the sustainability of the aquatic food web. However, future warming oceans could significantly alter the populations of these important organisms, further impacting climate change. Since phytoplankton play a major role in the food chain and the world’s carbon, nitrogen and phosphorous cycles, a significant decline...

Scientists at the University of Rhode Island's Graduate School of Oceanography have made the first observation of a predator avoidance behavior by a species of phytoplankton, a microscopic marine plant. Susanne Menden-Deuer, associate professor of oceanography, and doctoral student Elizabeth Harvey made the unexpected observation while studying the interactions between phytoplankton and zooplankton. Their discovery will be published in the September 28 issue of the journal PLOS ONE. "It...

When WHOI geologist Liviu Giosan first reconstructed the history of how the Danube River built its delta, he was presented with a puzzle. In the delta’s early stages of development, the river deposited its sediment within a protected bay. As the delta expanded onto the Black Sea shelf in the late Holocene and was exposed to greater waves and currents, rather than seeing the decline in sediment storage that he expected, Giosan found the opposite. The delta continued to grow. In fact, it...

Researchers see natural cycle; but questions arise on climate change For the first time, scientists have identified tropical and subtropical species of marine protozoa living in the Arctic Ocean. Apparently, they traveled thousands of miles on Atlantic currents and ended up above Norway with an unusual—but naturally cyclic—pulse of warm water, not as a direct result of overall warming climate, say the researchers. On the other hand: arctic waters are warming rapidly, and such pulses...

The results, which were published in the scientific journal Nature, provide a valuable contribution to a better understanding of the global carbon cycle An international research team has published the results of an ocean iron fertilization experiment (EIFEX) carried out in 2004 in the current issue of the scientific journal Nature. Unlike the LOHAFEX experiment carried out in 2009, EIFEX has shown that a substantial proportion of carbon from the induced algal bloom sank to the deep sea...

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports - Your Universe Online Scientists studying the annual growth of tiny plants in the North Atlantic Ocean have discovered that this year’s growth spurt began before the sun was able to offer the light needed to fuel the yearly phenomenon. The annual growth spurt of plankton, which is known as the North Atlantic Bloom, takes place each Spring, and results in an immense number of phytoplankton bursting into existence -- first "greening," then "whitening"...

The pico is a very small unit, even smaller than the nano as it is the equivalent of 10-12. The biologist Aitor Alonso has devoted himself to studying green algae of this imperceptible size existing in the Bilbao estuary, paying particular attention to the area beyond the Nervión estuary. This has enabled him to identify six genera and eleven nano- and picoplanktonic species that until now had not been catalogued in these waters. He has also put forward some measures designed to optimize the...

Acting through links between four trophic levels and across two ecosystems, purple loosestrife altered life in nearby ponds An elementary school science activity asks children who have each been assigned a wetland plant or animal to connect themselves with string and tape to other “organisms” their assigned plant or animal interacts with in some way. Once an ecosystem web has been created, the teacher describes an event that affects one “organism.” That “organism” tugs on...