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Water is the medium of the oceans, the medium which carries all the substances and elements involved in the marine biogeochemical cycles. Water as found in nature almost always includes dissolved substances, so water has been described as the "universal solvent" for its ability to dissolve so many substances.
The water from the hydrothermal vent is rich in dissolved minerals and supports a large population of chemoautotrophic bacteria. These bacteria use sulfur compounds, particularly hydrogen sulfide , a chemical highly toxic to most known organisms, to produce organic material through the process of chemosynthesis .
CaCO 3 is supersatured in the great majority of ocean surface waters and undersaturated at depth, [10] meaning the shells are more likely to dissolve as they sink to ocean depths. CaCO 3 can also be dissolved through metabolic dissolution (i.e. can be used as food and excreted) and thus deep ocean sediments have very little calcium carbonate. [16]
In the ocean by volume, the most abundant gases dissolved in seawater are carbon dioxide (including bicarbonate and carbonate ions, 14 mL/L on average), nitrogen (9 mL/L), and oxygen (5 mL/L) at equilibrium at 24 °C (75 °F) [124] [125] [126] All gases are more soluble – more easily dissolved – in colder water than in warmer water. For ...
Deep ocean water contains the largest reservoir of nitrogen available to hydrothermal vents, with around 0.59 mM of dissolved nitrogen gas. [24] [25] Ammonium is the dominant species of dissolved inorganic nitrogen, and can be produced by water mass mixing below hydrothermal vents and discharged in vent fluids. [25]
Marine chemistry, also known as ocean chemistry or chemical oceanography, is the study of the chemical composition and processes of the world’s oceans, including the interactions between seawater, the atmosphere, the seafloor, and marine organisms. [2]
However, most marine primary production comes from organisms which use photosynthesis on the carbon dioxide dissolved in the water. This process uses energy from sunlight to convert water and carbon dioxide [4]: 186–187 into sugars that can be used both as a source of chemical energy and of organic molecules that are used in the structural ...
Photosynthetic organisms release O 2 gas into the water. Thus, an area of the ocean supersaturated with O 2 gas can likely determined to be rich with photosynthetic activity. Though some O 2 will naturally be found in the ocean due to simple physical chemical properties, upwards of 70% of all oxygen gas found in supersaturated regions can be ...