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Phytoplankton (/ ˌ f aɪ t oʊ ˈ p l æ ŋ k t ə n /) are the autotrophic (self-feeding) components of the plankton community and a key part of ocean and freshwater ecosystems.The name comes from the Greek words φυτόν (phyton), meaning 'plant', and πλαγκτός (planktos), meaning 'wanderer' or 'drifter'.
Plants, along with other primary producers, produce the energy that other living beings consume, and the oxygen that they breathe. [3] It is thought that the first organisms on Earth were primary producers located on the ocean floor. [3] Autotrophs are fundamental to the food chains of all ecosystems in the world. They take energy from the ...
All of these habitats are able to sequester large quantities of carbon and support a biodiverse range of larger and smaller animal life. [76] Marine plants can be found in intertidal zones and shallow waters, such as seagrasses like eelgrass and turtle grass, Thalassia. These plants have adapted to the high salinity of the ocean environment.
Phytoplanktons' density (1.02 g/cm 3) is higher than that of sea water (1.00 g/cm 3).Therefore, they sink in the ocean, unless there is an upward movement of water. However, nanophytoplankton, with as small as a 1 μm radius, can swim in the ocean, but at a very slow rate, like "a human swimming in m
Autotrophic protists that make their own food without needing to consume other organisms, usually by photosynthesis (sometimes by chemosynthesis) Green algae, Pyramimonas: Red and brown algae, diatoms, coccolithophores and some dinoflagellates. Plant-like protists are important components of phytoplankton discussed below. Animal-like
Marine botany is the study of flowering vascular plant species and marine algae that live in shallow seawater of the open ocean and the littoral zone, along shorelines of the intertidal zone, coastal wetlands, and low-salinity brackish water of estuaries. It is a branch of marine biology and botany.
Furthermore, because seagrasses are underwater plants, they produce significant amounts of oxygen which oxygenate the water column. These meadows account for more than 10% of the ocean's total carbon storage. Per hectare, it holds twice as much carbon dioxide as rain forests and can sequester about 27.4 million tons of CO 2 annually. [85]
Marine life, sea life or ocean life is the collective ecological communities that encompass all aquatic animals, plants, algae, fungi, protists, single-celled microorganisms and associated viruses living in the saline water of marine habitats, either the sea water of marginal seas and oceans, or the brackish water of coastal wetlands, lagoons ...