File:Worldwide view of oceans phytoplankton earth observatory nasa.gif

Tiny Blue Green

• http://www.greenpolicy360.net/w/TinyBlueGreen

Science is just beginning to study the role of 'the tiny little ones' in the oceans

Removing Carbon, Adding Oxygen: Plankton's Role is Critically Important

• http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature16942.html

The biological carbon pump is the process by which CO2 is transformed to organic carbon via photosynthesis, exported through sinking particles, and finally sequestered in the deep ocean. While the intensity of the pump correlates with plankton community composition, the underlying ecosystem structure driving the process remains largely uncharacterized. Here we use environmental and metagenomic data gathered during the Tara Oceans expedition to improve our understanding of carbon export in the oligotrophic ocean....

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Feb 10, 2016 -- Via Phys.org

Plankton carries carbon to safe resting spot, ocean study reveals

The ocean's power to rein in carbon and protect the environment is vast but not well-understood.

But now, an international team of scientists has begun to illuminate how the ocean plucks carbon from the atmosphere, where it contributes to global warming, and shuttles it to the bottom of the sea.

The new study establishes the important role of plankton networks in removing carbon from the atmosphere and depositing it deep in the ocean. And it opens up opportunities for caring for the ocean in ways that encourage it to absorb more carbon.

The knowledge comes out of the unprecedented three-year Tara Oceans Expedition, in which a team of more than 200 experts took to the sea to catalog and better understand the unseen inhabitants of the ocean, from tiny animals to viruses and bacteria.

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Be a Planktonaut!

The Tara Project

• http://oceans.taraexpeditions.org/en/m/about-tara/

• http://oceans.taraexpeditions.org/en/

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• http://planktonchronicles.org/en/the-project/

• http://planktonplanet.org/

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Plankton's effect on ocean's carbon storage

• http://phys.org/news/2015-05-uncovering-diversity-invisible-ocean-world.html

• http://phys.org/news/2015-11-rapid-plankton-growth-ocean-carbon.html#nRlv

• http://phys.org/news/2013-02-climate-clues-tiny-marine-algaeancient.html#nRlv