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@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-08-23 14:00:45

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
Last week, I mentioned a ciliate that can cause red tide #blooms. Mesodinium rubrum is an example of a unicellular organism that can both injest food and photosynthesize. Its main prey are cryptomonad

image/jpeg a graphic drawing of Mesodinium rubrum of a round organism with extended spines consuming a Geminigera cryophila cell that has two flagella. Text reads "Steals prey nucleus (kleptokaryon) and other organelles. Final diagram shows organelles inside the cell. From Johnson et al. 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2023.01.027
image/jpeg a microscope photograph of an oblong orange - brown cell with distinctive radiating spines from the sides. Mesodinium rubrum from NOAA, public domain.
@filmfacts@social.tchncs.de
2025-10-16 14:14:23

#PlanktonSocial
Tja, was soll ich sagen? Funktioniert einfach :-) So können sich #Blogger/innen ohne eine große Plattform untereinander vernetzen und gleichzeitig die eigene Basis und Domain nutzen.

Plankton.social
Tja, was soll ich sagen? Funktioniert einfach :-) So können sich Blogger/innen ohne eine große Plattform untereinander vernetzen und gleichzeitig die eigene Basis und Domain nutzen.

Weiterlesen ›
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-09-20 13:45:49

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
Meroplankton is a grouping of "temporary zooplankton" that only spend a portion of their life cycle there. One example is the nauplius larvae of barnacles. Though they don't look like it, barnacles are crustaceans, so they have nauplius stage for dispersal. They have very distinctive "horns" and are extremely common in plankton samples, wh…

image/jpeg a darkfield microscope image of a translucent wedge shaped crustacean zooplankton with 4 sets of spiny legs, a dark red eye spot and two distinctive pointed horn spines at the head. CC BY-SA 4.0.
image/jpeg a group of cream coloured barnacles are attached to grey rocks. They are closed tight. Northern Acorn Barnacles, Ryan Hodnett CC BY-SA 4.0.
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-10-18 13:30:57

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
You've likely watched a police procedural where the lab states the drowning was suspicious because of algae. The shells of diatoms have long been used in forensic #limnology because they are made of glass, so preserve very well.

image/jpeg a wide diversity of shapes of coloured glass shells are seen in a microscopic image. CC BY-SA 4.0.
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-08-16 14:01:54

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
When most people think about algal blooms, they envision bright green water. However, blooms can also be dark red, invoking the colour of blood. A number of groups can generate red pigment blooms including flagellates like red-tide species Karenia brevis and Heterosigma akashiwo, Alexandrium spp. (Shellfish poisoning), the green algae Botryococcus braunii turning…

image/jpeg bright red water the colour of blood washes against rocks. Photo of Sea of Galilee unattributed.
image/jpeg bright orange water collects along the rocky shore in front of an elevated pier in a rugged inlet. Photo from Fisheries and Oceans Canada.
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-08-09 14:01:00

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
Did you know that plankton can get sunburn? UV radiation can affect microbes, #phytoplankton and #zooplankton by causing cellular molecular or genetic damage. Whil…

image/png a tiny crustacean with long extended antennae is dark orange with pigment in a microscope photograph. Photo: Hans Berggren in Hylander et al. 2012. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2435.2012.01976.x
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-09-13 13:40:45

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
An interesting survival mechanism of zooplankton is the production of resistant resting or diapause eggs. Calanoid and harpacticoid copepods, rotifers, and cladocerans (as ephippia) do this when conditions are poor due to overcrowding, predation, drought, or water quality. These eggs can hatch after decades or even centuries in an egg bank. This helps to explain …

image/jpeg a microscope photograph shows a spherical orange egg with a spiky surface. Calanoid diapause egg.
image/jpeg a microscope photograph shows a semicircular object with two inner dark ovals covered by a tough coating and a long spine to one side. Ephippium of Daphnia. Janek Lass CC BY-SA 4.0
image/jpeg a microscope photograph of a shrimp-like organism with long antennae carrying a dark egg filled sac on the tail. Calanoid copepod female CC BY-SA 4.0 Franz Neidl.
image/png a microscopic photograph of a transparent ovoid crustacean zooplankton carrying a distinctive large dark egg in a chamber on its back. Daphnia carrying an ephippium. James Grover.
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-08-02 14:00:34

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
Plankton have #parasites, just like any other organism, but in some cases, this leads to improved feeding conditions. #Daphnia zooplankton must often feed on freshwater cy…

image/jpeg microscope photo of long strands of brown-red algae with puffy globular growths on it. Planktothrix rubescens with chytrid infection. https://www.igb-berlin.de/en/project/integrating-fungal-parasites-plankton-ecology
image/jpeg microscope photograph of two transparent crustacean zooplankton with bright green guts are shown top and bottom. Photo of Daphnia dentifera from Meghan Duffy.
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-09-06 13:45:55

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
Many sessile marine organisms produce planktonic larvae for dispersal. This is true of the Bryozoa ("moss animals") in both freshwater and saltwater, which are often mistaken for sponges or corals. Larvae widely range in shape and lifestyle, but some larvae called cyphonautes can spend weeks feeding in the plankton. They are a distinctly flattened trian…

Side by side images of a distinctly triangular microscopic organism. On the left is a microscope image of a brown, mostly transparent bell shape with organelles inside and cilia around the edge (CC BY-SA 4.0). On the right is an anatomy diagram of the same organism with labels of: apical sense organ, ciliated ridge, inhalent chamber, and corona at the bottom. Taken from Hayward & Ryland (1998).
image/jpeg a clump of bright yellow-orange feathery balls are seen in an underwater photo on a reef. Bryozoans at Kreef Reef, Peter Southwood (CC SA 4.0)
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-10-11 13:45:28

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
Heliozoans are a group of amoeboid protists found commonly in both fresh and saltwater. They were termed sun-animalcules due to their spherical shape and distinctive radiating microtubules, which support axiopods used to capture food and facilitate movement. Some will also capture symbiotic algal cells which provide energy through photosynthesis. Heliozoa is &quo…

image/png a microscopic image of a spherical yellow organism filled with green dots and having numerous spines radiating from the surface. A scale of 50 microns indicates the sphere is about twice that measure. James L. Van Etten, Irina V. Agarkova, David D. Dunigan CC BY-SA 4.0. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Viruses-12-00020-g001_Chlorella_Virus_(C).png#mw-jump-to-license
image/jpeg a black and white diagram of a spherical cell with many radiating spines. The interior of the cell has many dark or white inclusions. Source unknown. 1888. Public Domain. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ott%C5%AFv_slovn%C3%ADk_nau%C4%8Dn%C3%BD_-_obr%C3%A1zek_%C4%8D._035_wb.jpg#mw-jump-to-license
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-10-04 13:45:06

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
While crustaceans are common as #zooplankton, insects are very rare, but one group is found globally in freshwaters. Chaoborus (phantom midge or glassworm) spend the majority of their life as predaceous plankton, but are familiar to many when the adults emerge lake…

image/jpeg a mostly transparent elongated organism with hooked antenna on the head and a wide fan of spines at the tail floats in the water. CC BY-SA 4.0.
image/jpeg what looks like dark clouds of smoke emerge from a tropical lake as seen from a rocky coast. From Scott Cable. http://wearthefoxhat.us/malawi-lake-flies/
image/jpeg a photograph of a fly insect with long legs, two dark eyes, and incredibly fuzzy large antennae. Phantom Midge Chaoborus crystallinus by Tony Pattinson https://www.quekett.org/resources/article-archive/bsw-2017/bsw17-phantom-midge.
image/jpeg a diagram showing the mechanical work of pH-sensitive resilin to control buoyancy of Chaoborus hydrostatic air-sacs. Acidic reduces buoyancy by contracting the air-sac volume. Alkaline does the opposite. From McKenzie et al. 2022, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2022.01.018
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-09-27 13:45:35

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
This is the phyllosoma larva of a Spiny "Rock" Lobster, which can spend as much as a year drifting in the plankton.
#MarineBiology #science

image/jpeg a darkfield micrograph of a spider-like transparent crustacean larva with extremely long legs and bulging stalked eyes. CC BY-SA 4.0
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-08-30 13:45:39

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
While algal #blooms are often associated with summer, they can occur in any season. SE #Australia is experiencing a prolonged bloom of Karenia mikimotoi (same genus as Flor…

image/jpeg two microscope images of a golden brown coloured algae cell on the left and a black and white SEM image on the right showing the distinct grooves, one lateral, on vertical where the flagella are located. Images from NOAA and WHOI.
image/jpeg photo of a person on a beach which has extensive piles of brownish white foam. Photo from ABC Caroline Horn. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-03-17/waitpinga-beach-foam-investigation/105060888
@DrPlanktonguy@ecoevo.social
2025-07-26 13:45:30

Weekend #Plankton Factoid 🦠🦐
27 M tonnes. Dutch NIOZ scientists found that nanoplastics (<1 μm) are not only widespread, but equivalent to the mass of macro & microplastics! Polyethylene terephthalate (PET), polystyrene (PS) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) #plastics don't just float on th…

image/jpeg scientists wearing hardhats retrieve a large sampler with 24 water sampling bottles arranged in a circle (rosette) off the side of a bright blue ship. Royal Netherlands Insitute for Sea Research (NIOZ) RV Pelagia during the 2023 DUST expedition.