Warren Currie 🦠🦐

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
Since 2011, millions of tons of a brown algae called Sargassum has washed onto beaches in the Caribbean. The rotting seaweed releases toxic hydrogen sulfide, smelling of rotten eggs, impacting tourism and shore access. It was initially thought Saharan iron dust was the cause, but new #science shows changes in upwelling of phosphorus led to increased symbiotic cyanobacteria, which fix atmospheric nitrogen to feed the seaweed.
https://scitechdaily.com/why-is-the-atlantic-ocean-drowning-in-seaweed-scientists-finally-solve-the-mystery/
#ClimateChange

Weekend #Plankton #Factoid 🦠🦐
The early phytoplankton fossil record is spotty, and often difficult to interpret being tiny and delicate. Recently, colonial algae fossils were identified from Canadian deposits with geometrically connected cells referred to as coenobia from the Cambrian period (~500 MA). Previously, these were thought to be resting cysts of a group called acritarchs. Instead, this colonial form is similar to existing green algae such as Pediastrum.
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2023.1882
#Science