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Many different species of phytoplankton are photosynthetic: They require sunlight to generate energy. When the ocean freezes over, less light can penetrate to the surface where they typically thrive. Scientists have been studying when and where the tiny organisms begin to flourish and have noted this typically occurs when the sea ice retreats. In recent years, work at the opposite end of the world, in the Arctic, has suggested masses of phytoplankton (or "blooms") can and do survive under sea ice in darker, low light conditions. [S]cientists collected data from 51 floating laboratories ("floats") deployed between 2014 and 2021. The...

As our living ark swings around the Sun, its current loop is fairly circular. But Earth's orbit isn't as stable as you may think. Every 405,000 years, our planet's orbit stretches out and becomes 5 percent elliptical, before returning to a more even path.... ... Beaufort and team suggest the lag seen between orbital eccentricity and changes in climate could hint that "coccolithophores may drive – rather than just respond to – carbon cycle changes." In other words, these minuscule little organisms, along with other phytoplankton, may help change Earth's climate in response to these orbital events....

“We think we may have found the answer. Increased circulation in the Southern Ocean allowed carbon dioxide to leak into the atmosphere, working to warm the planet,” said Princeton University’s Professor Daniel Sigman, co-author of the study. For years, researchers have known that growth and sinking of phytoplankton pumps carbon dioxide deep into the ocean, a process often referred to as the ‘biological pump.’ “The biological pump is driven mostly by the low latitude ocean but is undone closer to the poles, where carbon dioxide is vented back to the atmosphere by the rapid exposure of deep waters to the...

Guest Post by Willis EschenbachI’ve spent a good chunk of my life around, on, and under the ocean. I worked seasonally for many years as a commercial fisherman off of the western coast of the US. I’ve frozen off my begonias setting nets in driving sleet up in the Bering Sea. I’m also a blue-water sailor with a Pacific crossing under my belt, and a surfer, and both a sport and a commercial diver.Plus I’m eternally curious, so I have read about and studied the ocean all my life.Based on both my experience and my knowledge, I have written...

← John Nielsen-Gammon: Skeptics Are Not Deniers Unexplored Possible Climate Balancing Mechanism Posted on July 10, 2012 by Anthony Watts This visible image of a 93 mile wide deep-ocean plankton eddy was taken by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite ~ 800 km south of South Africa in the Agulhas current. Image: NASA’s Earth Observatory Effect of CO2 levels on phytoplankton.Story submitted by Don Healy This article opens up a whole new vista into the relationship between CO2 levels, oceanic plant growth and the complex relationships that we have yet to learn about in the...

An invasive species of mussel called quagga has recently begun eating its way through the phytoplankton population of Lake Michigan, which could have dire effects on the lake's ecosystem, scientists now warn. A giant ring of phytoplankton (microscopic plants such as algae) was discovered in Lake Michigan in 1998 by Michigan Technological Universitybiologist W. Charles Kerfoot and his research team. The "phytoplankton doughnut" is formed when winter storms kick up nutrient-rich sediment along the southeastern shore of the lake. The disturbed sediments begin circulating in a slow-moving circle with the lake's currents, which provides a massive supply of food for...

Now it’s a Phytoplanktonic panic Posted on July 30, 2010 by Anthony Watts Borrowing a phrase from NSIDC’s Dr. Mark Serreze, Phytoplankton are now apparently in a “Death Spiral”. See Death spiral of the oceans and the original press release about an article in Nature from a PhD candidate at Dalhousie University, which started all this. I’m a bit skeptical of the method which they describe in the PR here: A simple tool known as a Secchi disk as been used by scientists since 1899 to determine the transparency of the world’s oceans. The Secchi disk is a round disk,...

Atmospheric scientists have reported a new and potentially important mechanism by which chemical emissions from ocean phytoplankton may influence the formation of clouds that reflect sunlight away from our planet. This intimate connection between life and the environment of Earth could have profound implications for the future of our planet's global ecosystem. Discovery of the new link between clouds and the biosphere grew out of efforts to explain increased cloud cover observed over an area of the Southern Ocean where a large bloom of phytoplankton was occurring. Based on satellite data, the researchers hypothesized that airborne particles produced by oxidation...

Direct Link Discovered Between Agricultural Runoff And Algal Blooms In SeaScientists have found the first direct evidence linking large-scale coastal farming to massive blooms of marine algae that are potentially harmful to ocean life and fisheries. Researchers from Stanford University's School of Earth Sciences made the discovery by analyzing satellite images of Mexico's Sea of Cortez, also known as the Gulf of California - a narrow, 700-mile-long stretch of the Pacific Ocean that separates the Mexican mainland from the Baja California Peninsula. Immortalized in the 1941 book Sea of Cortez, by writer John Steinbeck and marine biologist Edward Ricketts, the...

Link post: Geology Picture of the Week, February 2-8, 2003

A combined oceanographic and geologic image today. Click the image below to see the larger image, which is only 515 MB. I was struck both by the phenomenon caught by the satellite and also the amazing colors of the Namibian landscape. See the link at the bottom for another Namibian feature of note, which is north of the area seen in this image. Web page: Sulfur plume off Namibia Brandberg Massif The Brandberg Massif is a highly- visible geologic feature that is familar to astronauts.

Breakaway Bergs Disrupt Arctic Ecosystem WASHINGTON, DC, May 9, 2002 (ENS) - Another large iceberg has newly calved from the Ross Ice Shelf, the National Ice Center has confirmed. Iceberg C-18 is the latest in a series of bergs to break away from the warming Antarctic ice mass. National Ice Center analyst Judy Shaffier spotted the new iceberg Sunday while performing a weekly satellite image analysis of the Ross Sea using an image from the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program. The Ross Ice Shelf is a large sheet of glacial ice and snow extending from the Antarctic mainland into the...