Dust storm blowing off the Australian east coast over the South Pacific.
Jeff Schmaltz/NASA GSFC
Iron-rich dust feeds phytoplankton. They are a key form of life in the Southern Ocean, which acts as a climate shock absorber.
Choksawatdikorn/Shutterstock
Explore the incredible underwater world of plankton.
A satellite image of a phytoplankton bloom off the coast of St. John’s, N.L.
(NASA, MODIS Rapid Response)
Recent research sheds light on the ocean’s annual ‘biological clock’ and highlights the key dynamics that make it susceptible to climate change.
Analyzing samples of polar bears can reveal not only what they ate but also the food web during their lives. Polar bears pictured live in captivity.
(AP Photo/Ronald Zak)
Comparison of modern and archaeological polar bears indicates that four millennia of food web stability has been disrupted by modern climate change.
Icebergs in Disko Bay, western Greenland.
Chris Christophersen/Shutterstock
Icebergs don’t just pose a risk to ships – they have a profound impact on the natural world and human societies.
Julian Uribe-Palomino/IMOS-CSIRO
Marine life known as zooplankton might be the biggest problem with getting carbon cycling right in climate models. The potential variations in carbon uptake are greater than global transport emissions.
We could sink more carbon in the ocean to fight climate change, but should we?
Eric Lafforgue/Art in All of Us/Corbis via Getty Images
From planting mangroves to dumping minerals in the ocean, there are lots of ideas for ocean carbon dioxide removal – and even more questions.
The Osun River has become turbid and unsafe for consumption - threatening its cultural and biodiversity significance. Photo by: Stefan Heunis/AFP via Getty Images.
from www,gettyimages.com
The ability of the Osun River to support biodiversity is being threatened by pollution and can only be rescued if the contamination ends.
Joost van Uffelen/Shutterstock
Plankton, some of the smallest organisms on Earth, are leading big changes in the ocean.
Himawari-8
This enormous, unprecedented algal bloom could have profound implications for carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere and for the marine ecosystem.
Saiko3p/Shutterstock
Glaciers aren’t sterile wastelands – they’re chock-full of microscopic life.
Shutterstock/Choksawatdikorn
These tiny organisms play a huge role in fighting climate change, but they’re under threat.
Ocean carbon storage is driven by phytoplankton blooms, like the turquoise swirls visible here in the North Sea and waters off Denmark.
NASA
Microscopic ocean phytoplankton feed a “biological pump” that carries carbon from the surface to deep waters. Scientists have found that this process stores much more carbon than previously thought.
Brett Wilks
Climate change is changing Antarctic krill habitat. The repercussions for the Southern Ocean food web are huge.
Dean Cropp
The spectacle of glowing dolphins should serve as a timely reminder of our need to conserve the darkness we have left.
Close-up of a marine nitrogen fixer colony.
Angelicque White
Nitrogen-fixing bacteria help tropical phytoplankton absorb carbon dioxide, creating a biological pump in the oceans.
A phytoplankton bloom stretching across the Barents Sea off the coast of mainland Europe’s most northern point.
European Space Agency
Populations of plankton are in decline. If we push this critical foundation of the marine food chain to extinction, we could cripple ecosystems for millions of years.
A camera catches a huge Greenland shark in eastern Baffin Bay, near Disko Bay, Greenland.
Jonathan Fisher
The eastern Arctic and sub-Arctic marine areas of Canada are changing rapidly under climate change.
Researchers investigated how acidic oceans affect plankton in Prydz Bay, East Antarctica.
Daniel A. Nielsen
Acidic oceans are disrupting a major part of the carbon cycle, slowing how seas absorb carbon from the atmosphere. This could massively speed up the effects of climate change.v
Richard Whitcombe/Shutterstock
New research shows that chemicals leached from ocean plastic impair the growth and oxygen production of the planet’s most abundant photosynthesiser - endangering marine ecosystems and the climate.