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| Alga (230) | |
Saving kelp forests and our climatethe kelp forests fringing the North Pacific coast are one of the richest marine ecosystems On earth.
Kelp beds buffer coastlines from storms and sequester carbon as effectively as tropical rainforests. One of the kelp forest's most endearing denizens, the sea otter, is an important key to its survival.
In some places this valuable kelp carbon store is mown disappearing down by a hungry army of sea urchins.
In this film marine ecologist Professor James A Estes, cameraman Doug Allan, ecological economist Pavan Sukhdev,
which would otherwise devour the kelp and disrupt the rich web of life that relies on it.
Pushed into coastal waters in wartime during the Tang Dynasty, these boat dwellers weren't allowed to set foot on land until the second half of the 20th century.
and seaweed-draped lines anchored in shallow seas by ancient peoples like the Tankas. The most advanced methods of mass production employ harmful antibiotics
this treacherous bit of sea is known as the triangle of death for good reason oe the considerable threat of great white sharks is increased by the conspicuous absence of kelp that otters normally use to hide.
suffocating other species. The vast blooms of red or green algae cause dead zones for kilometres, with the associated stench.
Foil-wrapped bars and powdered drinks such as Tang enjoyed a surge in status and popularity,
that feed primarily on seagrasses and are a common prey of sharks. In studies with elk, scientists have found that the presence of wolves alters their behavior almost constantly,
This allows the seagrass meadows to thrive, along with the range of other plant and marine animal species that depend on them.
leafy greens and seaweed#that were gathered in the wild. Mr. Rabins described foraging as collecting food that wont run away.#
What s more is a packet of ground seaweed is included, which makes it all the more enjoyable.
Even NASA is considering quinoa for long-duration planetary space flights perhaps as an apology for its Tang years.
Dulse: Dulse is a type of red algae and is an excellent source of iodine especially for those who avoid dairy.
Adults need about 150 micrograms daily according to the National institutes of health and without it our bodies will not function properly.
Instead of using iodized Salt i combine natural sea salt with dulse flakes. This way I also benefit from this sea vegetable's high potassium and antioxidant content.
Pond scum of death Through science and further testing of elk tissue samples and water samples the real killer has finally been found:
pond scum. Or more specifically a neurotoxin produced by one type of blue-green algae that can develop in warm standing water.
A bloom of this alga can be devastating to wildlife. In warm weather blooms of blue-green algae are not uncommon in farm ponds in temperate regions particularly ponds enriched with fertilizer according to a classic toxicology reference book Casarett and Doull's Toxicology:
Under these conditions one species of alga Anabaena flos-aquae produces a neurotoxin anatoxin-A which depolarizes and blocks acetylcholine receptors causing death in animals that drink the pond water.
so they drew from across the tree of life comparing aging patterns in 11 mammals 12 other vertebrates (animals with backbones) 10 invertebrates 12 plants and a green alga.
#Fish Poop Helps Spread Seagrass To spread and regenerate an important marine plant depends on animals to eat its seeds and poop them out around the ocean according to recent research.
and other seagrasses which globally can store up to twice as much carbon as the world's temperate and tropical forests according to a separate study.
By hitching a ride in these animals'digestive tracts the grasses'seeds can travel long distances establishing far-flung seagrass meadows.
Animals consuming seeds in one location and then excreting them in another location where they can germinate is said not new Matt Harwell a seagrass ecologist who was involved not in the study.
However it is a new finding for a seagrass species that is found across much of the world.
and resilience of a seagrass meadow to stresses especially since recent estimates suggest that seagrass loss globally is around 7 percent per year.
but for giant container ships the drag created by microorganisms in particular single-celled silica-shelled organisms called diatoms results in a significant amount of fuel loss every year.
Diatoms are one of the most common types of phytoplankton and a major group of algae.
For researchers in the lab of Edward Theriot at The University of Texas at Austin diatoms (and their snot) are rich objects of biological research.
For decades diatoms resisted study. Their genome is notoriously difficult to analyze. Morphological studies based on the shape of a species'shell or other features often contradicted the results of molecular testing.
and powerful supercomputers are helping researchers better understand the biology evolution and dispersion of the diatom.
Using these new tools researchers are trying to answer a number of basic questions about diatom evolution:
What were the earliest diatoms like? How has moved the organism from a single site to every body of water in the world?
The Search for the Ur-Diatom Researchers have sought to understand what the diatom's original ancestor might have looked like.
Though Theriot and his team are still in the early stages of their analysis some of their results are consistent enough that they can start to paint a picture of how the so-called ur-diatom may have appeared.
There's this idea that the early diatom was a small flagellate but what we're finding at the base of the diatom tree are things that are long and tubular much like the tube inside of a paper towel roll said Edward Theriot professor of molecular evolution at The University of Texas at Austin and director of its Texas Natural science
Center. In the diatom world this is a radical view but it's exactly what the tree is telling us.
To come to this conclusion the researchers analyzed ribosomal and chloroplast genes of more than 200 diatoms and Bolidomonas (a closely related genus). They wanted to test the prevailing understanding of where certain diatoms fall on the evolutionary tree
and included species used as models in genomic studies and diatoms whose placement in the diatom phylogeny has been problematic or controversial.
After generating massive amounts of data using next-generation gene sequencers they used the Ranger supercomputer at the Texas Advanced Computing Center to align organize
and analyze the DNA data and to run phylogenetic programs that sketched out the evolution of diatoms as a whole.
There are a number of programs that compare DNA sequences and estimate how those DNA sequences evolved from each other
what scholars thought about diatom evolution say 100 years ago. Using a statistical comparative approach the researchers arrived at a different tree of diatom evolution than traditionally conceived and a different point of origin.
They reported some of their early findings at the XXII International Diatom Colloquium in August 2012
and they continue to investigate the sequencing results in light of previous research. So how does the didymo make all that mucus?
They believe that closely related diatoms should share similar transcriptomes except for the mucilage-related genes.
and information about all the diatoms that they're working on. They also use it to manage information from their collaboration with researchers in Guam on the diatom flora of the coral reefs of the Pacific.
Want to explore the beautiful and microscopic world of diatoms? Check out the image gallery Diatoms of the Texas Gulf Coast.
Editor's Note: The researchers depicted in Behind the Scenes articles have been supported by the National Science Foundation the federal agency charged with funding basic research and education across all fields of science and engineering.
Any opinions findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author
#Super-Eruption Launched Algae Army Into the Sky Slimy brown algae not only survived a wild ride into the stratosphere via a volcanic ash cloud they landed on distant islands looking flawless a new study finds.
The diatoms were launched by the Taupo super-eruption on New zealand's North Island 25000 years ago.
More than 600 million cubic meters (20 billion cubic feet) of diatoms from a lake flew into the air Van Eaton reported Sept. 6 in the journal Geology.
Some diatoms drifted as far as the Chatham Islands 525 miles (850 kilometers) east of New zealand.
The pristine shells in the Chatham Island ash suggest diatoms could infect new niches by coasting on atmospheric currents.
Biggest Volcanoes On earth World domination cell by cell Diatoms a golden brown algae rule Earth's waterways.
From Antarctica's glacial lakes to acidic hot springs to unkempt home aquariums diatoms are everywhere.
The tiny creatures pump out up to 50 percent of the planet's oxygen said Edward Theriot a diatom expert and evolutionary biologist at the University of Texas at Austin who was involved not in the study.
How diatoms manage to colonize new homes remains a mystery: They can't swim. Yet diatoms get around.
When Wyoming's Yellowstone Lake emerged from its mile-thick ice cover 14000 years ago diatoms quickly arrived Theriot said.
They had to be blown in by some mechanism or carried in by water birds he added.
Diatoms particularly love volcanic lakes because they are the only creatures that build shells of glass.
and silica is the key ingredient in diatom shells. Yellowstone Lake which sits in a caldera created by a super-eruption contains so many diatoms that the lake sediments are mostly shells (85 percent by weight) Theriot said.
Now scientists know what happens to diatoms when a massive volcano like Yellowstone blasts through a big lake.
Immaculate preservation The Taupo Volcano super-eruption slammed through a deep lake that filled a rift valley similar to the elongated lakes in East Africa.
Van Eaton discovered the diatoms while examining the volcanic hail with a scanning electron microscope. The first time I ever saw them I was looking at these volcanic ash aggregates
Van Eaton soon determined that one of the three diatom species entombed in the ash only lives on the North Island of New zealand.
The unique North Island diatoms turned up in a few inches of ash on the Chatham Islands.
The diatoms'trip to the Chatham Islands took longer than it looks on a map.
Some of the diatoms even kept their color both in ash close to the volcano and at the Chatham Islands.
But even though the Taupo diatom shells are pristine Theriot is doubtful any diatoms lived through the eruptions.
Instead he suspects diatom resting spores could travel the atmospheric currents dropping out and colonizing new ecosystems.
Diatoms fashion spores to ride out inhospitable changes in their environment Two years ago Danish researchers revived 100-year-old resting spores from muck in a local fjord.
and best documented example of this phenomenon and so it really says maybe we can add volcanoes to the list of possibilities of how diatoms spread.
But Theriot is skeptical that diatoms will prove to be a useful tool for tracking volcanic ash.
Diatoms are so global that endemic species known only to one place are hard to find he said.
If you found diatoms in ash deposits in a bog in Ohio you would have no idea
It would take a really extraordinary set of circumstances like this New zealand diatom that is clearly out of place to be convincing that the diatoms had blown in with the ash.
when diatoms (a type of algae with hard cell walls made ofâ silica) settled on the lake bottom alternating with layers of clay and volcanic ash.
They say kelp gulls at Peninsula Valdes land on the backs of the cetaceans to eat their skin and blubber.
Greens sprouts and even seaweed may help create a balanced diet. Indeed astronauts have grown successfully peas
Sea turtles depending on the species may eat seagrasses algae sponges sea squirts squid shrimp crabs jellyfish cuttlefish or sea cucumbers.
Green sea turles (Chelonia myadis) on the other hand are herbivores that feed on algae and seagrasses. A freshwater turtle's diet is varied
and red algae mollusks crustaceans and small fish according to Sea world. Their tendency to eat both vegetation
Hundreds of years later when a dynasty called the Tang came to power in China Guan was honored for his righteous loyalty#to his lord Liu Bei writes Whalen Lai a professor emeritus of religious studies at the University of California
including thale cress (Arabidopsis thaliana), rice (Oryza sativa), maize (Zea mays) and a green alga (Chlamydomonas reinhardtii),
Nature Newsan international effort to protect coastal wetlands by assigning them carbon credits kicked off last week in Paris. The aim is to do for some wetland plants mangroves, seagrasses and salt marshes
and in its watery depths are acres of seagrass meadows that use about 15%of the dissolved carbon to grow.
because no one knows exactly how many seagrass beds and salt marshes exist. Some regions, such as North america, are audited well;
when it comes to seagrasses. Earth-observing satellites lack the ability to look into turbid waters
sea lettuce that stores little carbon and algae attached to rocks. Data from Landsat satellites revealed the true extent of mangroves only last year.
The team found that flatfish, molluscs, crustaceans and brown seaweed offshore of Fukushima received radiation doses that,
The researchers, led by paleontologist Feng Tang of the Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences in Beijing,
Biofuel from beneath the wavesbioengineers have devised a way to produce ethanol from seaweed, laying the groundwork for a biofuel that doesn't sacrifice food crops.
so that it could digest brown seaweed and produce ethanol. Their work is published in Science today1.
Yoshikuni says that his group chose brown seaweed because it was both sustainable and scalable."
"Seaweed is produced already in huge quantities around the world without taking up any fresh water or arable land.
Brown seaweed also grows faster than red or green seaweed, with varieties such as the giant kelp, found off the coast of California, growing by up to a metre a day.
and have turned to different feedstocks including switchgrass, the succulent plant jatropha, cyanobacteria and green algae. However, producing biofuels from sugar cane
But producing biofuels from seaweed has so far proved difficult for bioengineers. Seaweed produces four kinds of sugars laminarin, mannitol, alginate and cellulose.
The biggest fraction in brown seaweed is alginate, which is a complex polysaccharide and tricky for microbes to digest."
"Alginate is the key to unlocking the potential of brown seaweed. So using Vibrio splendidus, a marine microbe that can digest brown seaweed,
Yoshikuni and his team isolated a biochemical pathway that breaks down alginate. They inserted the genes responsible into a strain of E coli,
enabling the direct production of ethanol from brown seaweed. This strain of E coli could, in theory, be engineered to produce a variety of other useful chemicals and fuels."
who also studies biofuel production from seaweed. Jin works with red seaweed, which is less abundant in the world s oceans than brown seaweed,
but"relatively easy to ferment using yeast, he says, because of its lower alginate content2. Stephen Mayfield, director of the San diego Center for Algae Biotechnology at the University of California San diego, calls the work"a very sophisticated engineering feat,
but adds"so far this has almost nothing to do with bioenergy production. The main challenge in biofuels is not the ability to degrade complex carbohydrates and turn them into simple sugars,
people have farmed seaweed for hundreds of years, but only produce several thousand tonnes a year for food.
The US study team was led by Guangwen Tang a nutrition scientist at Tufts University in Boston, Massachusetts,
The CCTV programme disclosed an email sent by Yin to Tang in which the CDC official said that he had changed the wording to avoid mentioning Golden Rice
And Tang brought Golden Rice from the United states to China illegally, without due declaration to the relevant Chinese authorities,
Tang did not respond to Nature s request for comments. Tufts University spokeswoman Andrea Grossman said in an official statement that"it would be premature for Tufts University to reach any conclusions before investigations currently underway in the United states are completed.
US$1. 7 Â million Total funding for each winner of the Tang Prize, new science prizes announced by Taiwanese billionaire Samuel Yin on 28 january.
is an oomycete a type of single-celled organism related to brown algae. Carried by infected potatoes,
says reserve director Tang Chendong, so far consuming more than 10%of the wetland. It colonizes an area by forming dense bundles with deeply penetrating roots squeezing out native plants
says Tang, and authorities in Shanghai feared that herbicides would damage native plants, wildlife and local fisheries.
GM-rice fallout Guangwen Tang, a nutrition scientist at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, has been banned by the university from conducting human research for two years owing to ethics violations in a study
Tang tested the health benefits of Golden Rice genetically modified to produce a Vitamin a precursor on children in China s Hunan province (see Nature http://doi. org/nv9;
Radiation is being in found in seaweed zooplankton and sea life in the oceans. Animal and plant mutations are being found everywhere.
says co-author Qiuhong Tang of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Still an increase of precipitation is also challenging--the additional water may cause water logging flooding
They then applied iron oxide using an automated layer-by-layer surface sol-gel process they had developed earlier for coating diatom shells made of silica.
Sea otters protect kelp forests by eating sea urchins. These are what ecologists call keystone species: critters that control an ecosystem and have a disproportionate impact on other species. And in the forests of New england
picoplankton instead of the larger diatoms typically found in highly productive ecosystems today. Indeed large marine animals--sharks tunas whales seals even seabirds--mostly became abundant
They also can be derived from cane sugar and seaweed for use as a low-calorie (1. 5--2 Kcal/g) food sweetener and supplement.
According to researchers animals on organic farms should have supplemented their diets with natural sources of iodine such as seaweed
Seaweed as an alternative sourcenevertheless according to LÃ pez the most relevant aspect of the study is that it brings this limitation to light
We are trialling the use of seaweed as a source of iodine and have had good results she affirms.
Co-authors are Chong Liu Jinyao Tang Hao Ming Chen and Bin Liu. Solar technologies are the ideal solutions for carbon-neutral renewable energy--there's enough energy in one hour's worth of global sunlight to meet all human needs for a year.
#First expansion of sea potato seaweed into New Englandthere's a new seaweed in town a brown bulbous balloon befitting the nickname sea potato.
The seaweed was documented in Nova scotia in the 1960s but never on the U s. Atlantic coast until Green and Traggis's diving trip in 2011.
when they reevaluated photographs sent from concerned individuals in mid-coastal Maine they confirmed that the seaweed had appeared there in 2010.
--and it's quickly become prominent in the rocky intertidal zone of the Gulf of Maine attached to common seaweeds like rockweed or Corallina officinalis also known as coral weed.
The seaweed earned its oyster thief nickname after its introduction to France in the early 1900s led to significant damage to the oyster industry.
The seaweed was like a balloon attached to the oysters. Literally whole oyster beds disappeared because they floated away says Traggis a master's student from Buzzards Bay Mass.
It occurs in high density on many local seaweeds and it's competing with them for space nutrients
The paper Southern expansion of the brown alga Colpomenia peregrina Sauvageau (Scytosiphonales) in the Northwest Atlantic ocean was published in the December 2012 issue of Botanica Marina.
The little crustacean grazers some resembling tiny shrimp are critical in protecting seagrasses from overgrowth by algae helping keep these aquatic havens healthy for native
The researchers found that these plant-eating animals feast on the nuisance algae that grow on seagrass ultimately helping maintain the seagrass that provides nurseries for seafood.
Drifting seaweed usually thought of as a nuisance also plays a part in this process providing an important habitat for the grazing animals that keep the seagrass clean.
In seagrass systems tiny grazers promote healthy seagrasses by ensuring algae is consumed quickly rather than overgrowing the seagrass.
And by providing additional refuge from predators fleshy seaweeds that drift in and out of seagrass beds can maintain larger grazer populations
and enhance their positive impact on seagrass. USGS scientist Jim Grace a study coauthor emphasized that seagrass habitats are also quite beneficial to people.
Not only do these areas serve as nurseries for commercially important fish and shellfish such as blue crabs red drum and some Pacific rockfish but they also help clean our water
These tiny animals by going about their daily business of grazing are integral to keeping healthy seagrass beds healthy.
In fact the authors wrote if not for the algal munching of these grazers algae could blanket the seagrasses blocking out sunlight
which would ultimately kill the seagrasses. Seagrass declines in some areas are attributed partly to excessive nutrients in water bodies stimulating excessive algal growth on seagrasses.
Coastal managers have been concerned for years about excess fertilizer and sediment loads that hurt seagrasses said J. Emmett Duffy of Virginia Institute of Marine Science and coauthor of the study.
Our results provide convincing field evidence that grazing by small animals can be just as important as good water quality in preventing nuisance algae blooms and keeping seagrass beds healthy.
The USGS scientists involved in this study serve as members of a worldwide consortium of researchers examining the health of seagrasses.
This research by Virginia Institute of Marine Science and USGS researchers is the first in a series of studies worldwide on seagrass ecosystems.
Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by United states Geological Survey. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.
Though similar studies have been done on other alga species dinoflagellate microalgae have shown themselves to be a very promising group that stands out from the rest.
But Chuanbing Tang at the University of South carolina is developing new plastics that are green from the cradle to the grave.
Rather than tapping a barrel of oil to obtain starting materials Tang's research group
Renewable polymers currently suffer from inferior performance in comparison to those derived from petroleum Tang said.
Tang just received a National Science Foundation CAREER award to further develop the polymer chemistry he has been refining
The award from NSF's Division of Materials Research will support Tang's laboratory through 2018.
and architectures dictate the properties of the materials we make Tang said. If we can establish clear structure-property relationships we will be able to achieve the kinds of results we now get from polymers made from petroleum.
According to Tang molecules derived from wood products are particularly worthwhile targets. They're a rich source of the cycloaliphatic
Most plastics from nonrenewable resources are generally not biodegradable Tang said. With a polymer framework derived from renewable sources we're able to make materials that should break down more readily in the environment.
Together with graduate student Perry Wilbon Tang worked with Fuxiang Chu of the Chinese Academy of Forestry to prepare the first comprehensive review of terpenes terpenoids
Published as the cover article in Wiley's Macromolecular Rapid Communications in January 2013 the review is a blueprint for just one approach that Tang is taking to develop sustainable polymers from the greenest of sources.
As a junior faculty member at Brown along the shores of Rhode island he noticed that seaweeds
In our lifetimes we're watching Caribbean coral reefs die kelp forests die and salt marshes and sea grass beds being decimated.
#Food, fuel and more will be produced in sea farms of futuremeet the farm of the future where common seaweed is being upgraded from an environmental problem to a valuable natural resource and raw material.
The excessive fertilisation (eutrophication) of our seas results in an over-production of algae commonly known as seaweed.
Already seaweed is getting scooped up from the Baltic sea along Sweden's southern coast in order to be converted to biogas.
The coast is rich with the seaweed. The city of Trelleborg estimates that its beaches host an excess of algae that is equivalent to the energy from 2. 8 million litres of diesel fuel.
The brown algae known as sugar kelp (Saccharina latissima) for example contain up to three times as much sugar as sugar beet.
One fast-growing algae species that has been selected for Seafarm's algaculture is sugar kelp--a common type of kelp.
There was a 65 per cent reduction in large seaweeds a 60 per cent reduction in other algae and invertebrates and a 40 per cent reduction in the overall number of species present.
Algal forests or seaweeds provide food and shelter to hundreds of species and fulfil a role similar to trees in terrestrial forests.
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