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Invoking images of the open ocean's surface, the imagination can conjure up an endless empty space. A flat line parting the blue below from the blue above. But in reality a diverse array of species occupy this unique boundary layer. A tangle of terms exist for different organisms occupying different niches of the ocean's surface.
The pelagic food web, showing the central involvement of marine microorganisms in how the ocean imports nutrients from and then exports them back to the atmosphere and ocean floor. A marine food web is a food web of marine life. At the base of the ocean food web are single-celled algae and other plant-like organisms known as phytoplankton.
Food cycle is an obsolete term that is synonymous with food web. Ecologists can broadly group all life forms into one of two trophic layers, the autotrophs and the heterotrophs. Autotrophs produce more biomass energy, either chemically without the sun's energy or by capturing the sun's energy in photosynthesis, than they use during metabolic ...
The tiny (0.6 μm) marine cyanobacterium Prochlorococcus, discovered in 1986, forms today an important part of the base of the ocean food chain and accounts for much of the photosynthesis of the open ocean [140] and an estimated 20% of the oxygen in the Earth's atmosphere. [141]
Colored dissolved organic matter (CDOM) is estimated to range from 20-70% of the carbon content of the oceans, being higher near river outlets and lower in the open ocean. [5] DOM can be recycled and put back into the food web through a process called microbial loop which is essential for nutrient cycling and supporting primary productivity. [6]
The mass of the oceans is approximately 1.35 × 10 18 metric tons, or about 1/4400 of the total mass of the Earth. The oceans cover an area of 3.618 × 10 8 km 2 with a mean depth of 3,682 m, resulting in an estimated volume of 1.332 × 10 9 km 3. [20]
The benthic boundary layer, which includes the bottom layer of water and the uppermost layer of sediment directly influenced by the overlying water, is an integral part of the benthic zone, as it greatly influences the biological activity that takes place there. Examples of contact soil layers include sand bottoms, rocky outcrops, coral, and ...
The sea surface microlayer (SML) is the boundary interface between the atmosphere and ocean, covering about 70% of Earth's surface. With an operationally defined thickness between 1 and 1,000 μm (1.0 mm), the SML has physicochemical and biological properties that are measurably distinct from underlying waters.