Phytoplankton
hidePhytoplankton are the autotrophic component of the plankton community. The name comes from the Greek words phyton, or "plant", and πλαγκτος ("planktos"), meaning "wanderer" or "drifter". Most phytoplankton are too small to be individually seen with the unaided eye. However, when present in high enough numbers, they may appear as a green discoloration of the water due to the presence of chlorophyll within their cells (although the actual color may vary with the species of phytoplankton present due to varying levels of chlorophyll or the presence of accessory pigments such as phycobiliproteins, xanthophylls, etc.).
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News tagged with phytoplankton
Newly Discovered Fat Molecule: An Undersea Killer with an Upside
Nov 05, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- A chemical culprit responsible for the rapid, mysterious death of phytoplankton in the North Atlantic Ocean has been found by collaborating scientists at Rutgers University and the Woods Hole ...
New insight into predicting cholera epidemics in the Bengal Delta
Nov 04, 2009 |
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Cholera, an acute diarrheal disease caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae, has reemerged as a global killer. Outbreaks typically occur once a year in Africa and Latin America. But in Bangladesh the epidemics occur twice ...
Planet's nitrogen cycle overturned by 'tiny ammonia eater of the seas'
Sep 30, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- It's not every day you find clues to the planet's inner workings in aquarium scum. But that's what happened a few years ago when University of Washington researchers cultured a tiny organism from the bottom ...
Putting Plankton in Perspective, from Sea to Sky (w/ Video)
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
Jul 24, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- From the time he was 21 and working toward his Ph.D., Mike Behrenfeld has been observing phytoplankton -- floating ocean plants that have a global impact. Observing these tiny plants under ...
Iron and biological production in the high-latitude North Atlantic
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
Jul 07, 2009 |
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Southampton scientists have demonstrated an unexpected role of iron in regulating biological production in the high-latitude North Atlantic. Their findings have important implications for our understanding of ocean-climate ...
Breakthrough made in assessing marine phytoplankton health
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
May 28, 2009 |
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Researchers from Oregon State University, NASA and other organizations said today that they have succeeded for the first time in measuring the physiology of marine phytoplankton through satellite measurements ...
Timing is Everything for Northern Shrimp Populations in the North Atlantic
May 07, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Even for Northern shrimp (Pandalus borealis), which support commercial fisheries worldwide, timing is everything in life. The tiny creatures, eaten in shrimp rolls and shrimp salad, occupy ...
Ocean carbon: A dent in the iron hypothesis
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
May 06, 2009 |
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Oceanographers Jim Bishop and Todd Wood of the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have measured the fate of carbon particles originating in plankton blooms in the Southern Ocean, ...
Phytoplankton is changing along the Antarctic Peninsula
Mar 12, 2009 |
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As the cold, dry climate of the western Antarctic Peninsula becomes warmer and more humid, phytoplankton - the bottom of the Antarctic food chain - is decreasing off the northern part the peninsula and increasing further ...
Dust deposited in oceans may carry elements toxic to marine algae
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
Mar 09, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Dust blown off the continents and deposited in the open ocean is an important source of nutrients for marine phytoplankton, the tiny algae that are the foundation of the ocean food web. But ...
New research could help predict red tide
Biology /
Feb 19, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Not far beneath the ocean's surface, tiny phytoplankton swimming upward in a daily commute toward morning light sometimes encounter the watery equivalent of Rod Serling's Twilight Zone: a ...
Phytoplankton cell membranes challenge fundamentals of biochemistry
Feb 02, 2009 |
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Get ready to send the biology textbooks back to the printer. In a new paper published in Nature, Benjamin Van Mooy, a geochemist with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) and his colleagues report that microscopic plants ...
Ocean islands fuel productivity and carbon sequestration through natural iron fertilization
Space & Earth / Earth Sciences
Jan 30, 2009 |
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An experiment to study the effects of naturally deposited iron in the Southern Ocean has filled in a key piece of the puzzle surrounding iron's role in locking atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) in the ocean. The research, ...
Summer Storms Could Mean More Dead Zones
Jul 11, 2008 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- It's summertime and people are flocking to the coasts around the country. But when summer storms arrive, it's not only beach-goers who are affected; the rains can also have an impact on living ...
