Reporting by Helen Hill for the MIT Darwin Project
For the past several years, Rogier Braakman, a research scientist working in Penny Chisholm’s lab and collaborating with Mick Follows, has been studying how metabolism evolves in ocean microbes. In a new paper, he argues that intrinsic properties of cellular metabolism imposed central constraints on the historical trajectories of biospheric productivity and atmospheric oxygenation. Continue reading A Cellular View of Earth History
David Talmy, Stephen J. Beckett, Darcy A.A. Taniguchi, Corina P.D. Brussard, Joshua S. Weitz, and Michael J. Follows (2019), An empirical model of carbon flow through marine viruses and microzooplankton grazers, Environmental Microbiology, doi: 10.1111/1462-2920.14626 Continue reading An empirical model of carbon flow through marine viruses and microzooplankton grazers
Jozef I. Nissimov, David Talmy, Liti Haramaty, Helen Fredricks, Ehud Zelzion, Benjamin Knowles, Murat Eren, Rebecca Vandzura, Christien P. Laber, Brittany M. Schieler, Christopher T. Johns, Kuldeep More, Marco J.L. Coolen, Michael J. Follows, Debashish Bhattacharya, Benjamin A.S. Van Mooy, Kay D. Bidle (2019), Biochemical diversity of glycosphingolipid biosynthesis as a driver of Coccolithovirus competitive ecology, Enviromental Microbiology, doi: 10.1111/1462-2920.14633 Continue reading Biochemical diversity of glycosphingolipid biosynthesis as a driver of Coccolithovirus competitive ecology
Ruifeng Zhang, Rachel L. Kelly, Kathryn M. Kauffman, Amber K. Reid, Jonathan M. Lauderdale, Michael J. Follows, Seth G. John (2019), Growth of marine Vibrio in oligotrophic environments is not stimulated by the addition of inorganic iron, Earth and Planetary Science Letters, doi: 10.1016/j.epsl.2019.04.002 Continue reading Growth of marine Vibrio in oligotrophic environments is not stimulated by the addition of inorganic iron
by Helen Hill for MIT CBIOMES
The Redfield ratio, the atomic ratio of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus (C:N:P) in phytoplankton and deep ocean waters, has often been treated as a constant 106:16:1. A new paper involving several CBIOMES co-authors, among them two from the MIT Darwin Group, presents compelling evidence for what causes this ratio to change within phytoplankton. Continue reading When Phytoplankton Go Hungry
Former MIT Darwin Group member Keisuke Inomura, working with MIT CBIOMES investigator Mick Follows, presents a new quantitative model of nitrogen fixation in the presence of ammonium. Continue reading A Model for Nitrogen Fixation in the Presence of Ammonium
Climate-driven changes in phytoplankton communities will intensify the blue and green regions of the world’s oceans. New work from Darwin researchers Stephanie Dutkiewicz and Oliver Jahn. Continue reading Study: Much of the surface ocean will shift in color by end of 21st century
Omta, A. W., Ferrari, R., & McGee, D. (2018), An analytical framework for the steady state impact of carbonate compensation on atmospheric CO2, Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 32, 720–735, doi: 10.1002/2017GB005809 Continue reading An Analytical Framework for the Steady State Impact of Carbonate Compensation on Atmospheric CO2
Song, H., J. Marshall, M.J. Follows, S. Dutkiewicz, and G. Forget. Source waters for the highly productive Patagonian shelf in the southwestern Atlantic. Journal of Marine Systems – early online edition.
The elemental composition of organic matter is remarkably constant throughout the world’s oceans, but phytoplankton are known to take up nutrients and carbon in quite variable ratios depending on light and nutrient conditions.
In a paper published online in the journal Global Biogeochemical Cycles last month, Darwin Project researchers David Talmy (MIT), Christopher Hill (MIT), Anna Hickman (Univ. of Southampton, England), and Mick Follows (MIT), in a collaboration with Adam Martiny (Univ. of California, Irvine), report on their work seeking to understand what ecosystem factors could cause the elemental composition of organic matter to remain stable and relatively constant (homeostatic), even when the phytoplankton can have quite variable composition. Continue reading Keeping Things the Same