Essay Question For Next Test

Friday 2/15



Karenia brevis is the dinoflagellate responsible for the red tide in Florida and Texas. When it's in high concentrations, it causes the water to take on a reddish or pinkish color. It uses its two flagellas to move more easly through the water.


It is harmful to marine animals and humans, causing death and neurotoxic shellfish poisoning. Symptoms of neurotoxic shellfish poisoning include vomiting, nausea, and a variety of neurological symptoms such as slurred speech. As a result, the Gulf coast economy is negatively affected because it prevents people from being able to eat shellfish. Because the fisherman can't sell it, they economy takes a dive.

What I've Learned About Plankton

Thursday 2/14





I've learned many things about plankton this week, but I'll condense it to 5 main points. Unlike what I have believed my whole life, plankton are the world's main source of oxygen, not trees. They produce 80% of the Earth's oxygen. One reason why they are so important is that they are at the bottom of the food chain in the ocean. Without them the pyramid would fall apart. And lastly it improves immune function and brain health. Diatoms are single alga that has a cell wall of silica. Dinoflagellates are a single celled organism with two flagella and a cellulose covering. They form one of the chief constituents of plankton. Some dinoflagellates cause harmful effects on marine life because of the toxins they carry. Lastly, there are two main types of plankton, phytoplankton and zooplankton. Zooplankton are microscopic invertebrate animals that swim or drift in water while phytoplankton are microscopic plants in the ocean.

Bottle-nose dolphin

Wednesday 2/13



Common Name: Bottle-nose dolphin
Scientific Name: Tursiops truncatus
Habitat: coastal: adapt to warm, shallow waters because of its smaller body.
offshore: adapt to colder, deeper waters because they are bigger, they conserve heat.
Reproduction: In Florida, the females is sexually mature at 5-12 years, males at 10-13 years.
While in South Africa: females are sexually mature at 9-11 years, males at about 14.5 years.
Status: not considered to be endangered; its near-shore distribution, though, makes it vulnerable to environmental degradation, direct exploitation, and problems associated with local fisheries
Facts: They live 20 years or less based off the census in Florida.

The gestational period is about 12 months.
The adults eats about 5% of its body weight and a nursing mother eats 8%.
Issue: The Japanese and Taiwanese kill them for food. They are exposure to pollutants and biotoxins.
Some have parasites and other bacteria. They are often injured or killed due to fishing gear.
Reason: I picked the Bottlenose dolphin because my mom has told me about how she got to swim with dolphins before she had me. I've always thought that would be such a cool experience, and am really intrigued by this animal :)

Plankton Race

Tuesday 2/12

The most difficult part of this activity was getting it to go extremely slow. The first design ended up being the last one. We used a small fuzzy ball (like in the picture below) with a toothpick inside. If I could do this over I would change the design by just using the small plastic square we were given, it wouldve gone slower. The fact that we had free reign of the design without any regulations is what I liked best.

Harmful Algae Blooms

Monday 2/11

Algal blooms that have harmful or toxic phytoplankton are HABs. Because they look red or brown, they are also called red tides.

One of the causes of harmful algae blooms are saxitoxins. Saxitoxins are a large toxin family referred to as the Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning (PSP) toxins. When toxigenic marine dinoflagellates are eaten by shellfish, toxins concentrate and then the people who eat them consume it and get sick. The algal species itself can grow incredibly fast when conditions are right, like below.



Preventing HABs:
-control the things that create blooms such as the leaching and runoff of excess nutrients
-devices that result in the mixing of lakes (for example, by air bubbling), that enhance vertical mixing of the phytoplankton
-increasing the water flow through lakes or estuaries
-use compounds to chemically-precipitate phosphorus, and then take out the sediment by dredging, when managing an area or ridge of land that separates waters flowing to different rivers, basins, or seas
-adding alum, ferric salts or clay products so it will settle the phosphorus to the sediment layer
-suction dredging the top half meter of sediments

However, these efforts can be expensive and are best suited to small affected water bodies.

In 1953 the longest single red-tide episode was recorded, staying 18-months along the Florida Gulf Coast. There was a catastrophic amount of deaths of marine animals that were recorded from Tarpon Springs to Key West. During these events, there were reports of dead bottlenose dolphins, sea turtles, and numerous fish species.

Marine Plankton

Friday 2/8

They provide food for other animals.

The majority of our oxygen supply comes from plankton.
They show us where currents are and where healthy ecosystems are.

Dinoflagellates are apart of a group called alveolates. they are most common in marine and freshwater phytoplankton. some are heterotrophic. Diatoms, on the other other hand they are unicellular, photosynthetic algae with cell walls that contain silica.

Sea Star

Thursday 2/7

Common Name: Sea Star
Scientific Name: Asteroidea
Adaptations: A sea star has five arms, if one of them is cut off it can regenerate or grow back.
Habitat: lives on the sea floor
Interesting facts: they don't have a brain, only a nerve center that allows information to pass within the star, they are also omnivorous
I chose the sea star because for some reason I've always been fascinated with them. I think they're so freaking cool :)

The Trieste

Wednesday 2/6

The Trieste made its famous dive to the bottom of the Mariana Trench on January 23, 1960. To go down to the deepest point on the seafloor the bathyscaphe had 9 tons of iron shot for weights to bring it down. Plus the air tanks were flooded with seawater to help it sink even faster. It descended 3 feet per second until it reached a depth of 27,000 feet, when they slowed it down half as fast.

The Trieste only stayed at the bottom for 20 minutes, but getting there took almost 5 hours. At that depth, the pressure was more than 16,883 pounds per square inch put a bunch of stress on the Trieste, cracking an outer plexiglass window. Pretty intense stuff. Although, there weren't any other problems after that. The Trieste was the first and only vessel to enter the Mariana Trench in history. In 1963, it was used to find the Thresher and then was put in the Navy Museum in Washington DC.

Beebe and Barton

Tuesday 2/5

In 1935 Beebe and Barton dove and set several consecutive world records for the deepest dive ever performed by a human. The captain of their crew allowed the bathysphere to stay at the bottom for only 3 minutes before going back up. Beebe described eerie and extravagant undersea animals, along with large water voids with no apparent life. For years, no one believed him and they said he was making it all up. Then photographs and other scientists' observations verified his observations, and Beebe was officially credited with the discovery of hundreds of new life forms.

Beebe and Barton conducted dives in the Bathysphere together, marking the first time that a marine biologist observed deep-sea animals in their native environment. Through these dives, the bathysphere proved its qualities but also revealed weaknesses. It was hard to operate and involved considerable potential risks. A break in the suspension cable would have killed the men inside; surface waves and the boat moving could have caused such a thing. Because of these disadvantages, the bathysphere was replaced by the safer, more maneuverable mesoscaphe and bathyscaphe.

Why Should We Study The Ocean?

Monday 2/4

We should study the ocean for several reasons.

1. To expand our knowledge of sea creatures and discovering new species Who knows how many animals in the ocean we could learn about if we just dove a little deeper.



2. Also, we could discover new trade routes. Certain canals and seas could be faster to travel a certain way, and we just may have not realized it yet. If we study the ocean we might be able to figure out which route or path would be the most efficient with certain types of boats.



3. We could find more oil. With that we could boost the economy, ect ect.



4. We might even be able to understand the ocean, and therefore the weather, even better. If we could find a way to predict when a tsunami or typhoon, ect. is developing or when it will hit we could lengthen the amount of time we have to get people safe.



5. We may even be able to stop, or prevent global warming.

Boat Race

Friday 2/1

Well, due to the unfortunate event of the hair dryer's violent death, we were unable to race our boat. I went in on Friday during my lunch to race the boat and to make sure it wasn't touching the sides so it would properly race. After putting the 20 marbles in the boat (10 in each water bottle so the weight would be distributed evenly) I used the hair dryer on the lowest setting and tested it. There were only a couple times that it touched the sides, but all in all it raced quite well. Sure, it wasn't fast, but it did its job and sailed true. Throughout the testing I noticed that it actually sailed a lot better going backwards rather than the direction I had built it to sail. All in all, I think we did pretty well considering the time we had to make an entire new one after our beloved 1st one was violently taken from us. Below is a side shot of the final product.

Boat Design/Construction

Thursday 1/31

My boyfriend, Dallas, and I constructed a boat to race for Aquatic Science. The first model had a hull made up of two halved water bottles inside of each other. We superglued a couple sticks together as the mast and a sheet of paper as the mainsail. The keel was part of a rubber flipper that we cut and glued underneath the water bottles to help it sail straight. We didn't have a chance to test it in the pool with the hair dryer because another boat crushed ours and we had to make a new one. The new one is made up of two water bottles side by side with 3 pencils as support for the mast, and a triangle mainsail made up of foil wrapped around the pencils. We had two keels this time made up of Styrofoam. Because I didn't have a phone or a camera; I didn't have the chance to take pictures of our construction. But below there is a picture with the main parts of the sailboat that we made sure to have.

Feather Duster Worm

Wednesday 1/30



Sabellidae, or feather duster worms, are found in tropical and temperate waters worldwide, in depths of 7-165 feet, among stones or built on rock crevices. Some adaptations include: body building, multi-tasking, tubes within tubes, regenerating and reproducing.

The feather duster worm has no backbone. Its three body sections of head, thorax and abdomen reside in a flexible tube that the worm makes from tiny particles mixed with its own sticky mucus. The base of the tube is permanently attached to a hard surface such as rock or dead coral. Once anchored in place, the worm builds up its home by depositing thin strands of the mixture along the lip or collar of the tube. The internal organs occupy the center of the tube, surrounded by a layer of fluids and then a layer of muscle. The muscle layer flexes against the fluid layer to control the worm's movement.

1. • 
   • The feather duster part of the worm sifts the passing water for food and building material. This is called "suspension feeding." The versatile tentacles, called radioles, sit in two half-circles. As they sway, they catch particles of microscopic plankton, other edible organic matter and sediment, fine sand or calcium carbonate (chalk) for the tube layers. Grooves in the tentacles pass the particles down to the mouth. The tentacles also function as gills by collecting oxygen. Its organs resemble tubes more than individual organs. Food passes through a straight digestive tube. The unique blood system vessels contract so that blood ebbs and flows like tides rather than the typical one-way veins of animals. They can regenerate if bitten off or broken by predators, which include fish, other types of worms, starfish, jellyfish, shrimp and crabs. Feather duster worms are either male or female. Females release eggs into the water and males release sperm to fertilize them. Among the first animals to evolve, feather duster-type worms retain their numbers today. They are secure in their habitats and have a following from salt-water aquarium enthusiasts.

           

     
     

     I chose the feather duster worm because it's cute and interesting. Plus, I immediately thought of the character picture above from Beauty and the Beast. :)

Oceanographers and their instruments

Tuesday 1/29

Biological Oceanographer: plankton net
-Modification on the standard trawl used to collect planktonicorganisms, of nearly any size, intact. Towed by a research vessel, Plankton Nets have a long funnel shape that allows them to catch differently sized plankton simply by changing the mesh size of the net. At the end of the funnel is a collection cylinder called a cod-end.



Chemical Oceanographer: Nansen bottle
-The bottle, more precisely a metal or plastic cylinder, is lowered on a cable into the ocean, and when it has reached the required depth, a brass weight called a "messenger" is dropped down the cable. When the weight reaches the bottle, the impact tips the bottle upside down and trips a spring-loaded valve at the end, trapping the water sample inside. The bottle and sample are then retrieved by hauling in the cable.
A second messenger can be arranged to be released by the inverting mechanism, and slide down the cable until it reaches another Nansen bottle. By fixing a sequence of bottles and messengers at intervals along the cable, a series of samples at increasing depth can be taken.



Physical Oceanographer: current meter
-Current meters are usually deployed within an oceanographic mooring consisting of an anchor weight on the ground, a mooring line with the instrument(s) connected to it and a floating device to keep the mooring line more or less vertical. Like a kite in the wind, the actual shape of the mooring line will not be completely straight, but following a so-called (half-)catenary. Under the influence of water currents (and wind if the top buoy is above the sea surface) the shape of the mooring line can be determined and by this the actual depth of the instruments.



Geological Oceanographer: bathymetric maps
-Scientists studying the seafloor often use bathymetric maps like the one below. These maps use color to indicate water depth. On most bathymetric images of the ocean, colors on the “warm” end of the spectrum – red, orange, and yellow - represent shallower water. As the water deepens, the colors shift through green, blue, and finally into violet. Dry land is usually shown in white. All areas of the seafloor that are the same distance below the surface will be shown in the same color. When the color changes, so does the depth. In this way, 3-dimensional topography is shown on a 2-dimensional map. Once you become accustomed to the relationship between color and depth on bathymetric images, you will be able to see shapes and structures on the ocean bottom.



Geophysical Oceanographer: drilling ship
-A drillship is a maritime vessel that has been fitted with drilling apparatus. It is most often used for exploratory offshore drilling of new oil or gas wells in deep water or for scientific drilling. The drillship can also be used as a platform to carry out well maintenance or completion work such as casing and tubing installation or subsea tree installations. It is often built to the design specification of the oil production company and/or investors, but can also be a modified tanker hull outfitted with a dynamic positioning system to maintain its position over the well.



The greatest advantages these modern drillships have is their ability to drill in water depths of more than 2500 m and the time saved sailing between oilfields worldwide. Drillships are completely independent, in contrast to semi-submersibles and jackup barges. In order to drill, a marine riser is lowered from the drillship to the seabed with a blowout preventer (BOP) at the bottom that connects to the wellhead. Drillships are just one way to perform exploratory drilling. This function can also be performed by semi-submersibles, jackup barges, barges, or platform rigs.

Why We Explore?

Monday 1/28

Robert Ballard is perhaps best-known for his work in underwater archaeology; in addition to the Titanic, he has found the wrecks of the Bismarck, the USS Yorktown, the nuclear sub Thresher (on a top-secret mission for the Navy -- for which the Titanic was his cover story). His contributions to our scientific knowledge for the ocean is just as awe-inspiring. He was in the first team of humans to view the deep-sea vents, and to understand how life can not only survive but thrive in these deep, black waters, under extreme pressure and at extreme temperature. He founded the Institute for Exploration and has pioneered distance learning in classrooms around the world. On more than 120 deep-sea expeditions, Robert Ballard has made many major natural discoveries. "Mr. Ballard has long been blessed with the special luck of a successful explorer as well as the special knowledge of a leading scientist." -New York Times

I agree with Bob Ballard. We are so focused on looking up, exploring space ect., that we are ignoring what's right here on our planet already, waiting to be explored and discovered. The ocean takes up 72% of our planet. I mean, seriously, 1/4th of our planet is covered by a mountain range and we didn't even know it until after Armstrong stepped on the moon. If we used the money funding NASA we could explore the sea for more than a thousand years. 50% of our resources are under water, all we have to do is go down and get it. So yes, I 100% agree with Bob Ballard.