https:\/\/vimeo.com\/148673331<\/p>\n
S<\/span>ome of the planet\u2019s tiniest organisms are visible from space. Phytoplankton \u2014 single-celled, water-dwelling algae \u2014 are one-millionth of a meter in size and produce about 50 percent of the oxygen we breathe. These microscopic oxygen factories inhabit the sunlit portion of the world\u2019s oceans, supplying nourishment for much larger organisms and valuable information for\u00a0scientists.<\/p>\n Millions of phytoplankton swirl around in jugs of seawater, collected just moments before from the Equatorial Pacific Ocean. Adrian Marchetti<\/a> filters the water in his makeshift lab \u2014 an old garden shed on the Sierra Negra. This Gal\u00e1pagos National Park Service vessel is typically used to monitor the waters surrounding the islands. \u201cThese vessels don\u2019t have the equipment we usually use to do our work, so we had to improvise,\u201d Marchetti, an oceanographer in UNC’s College of Arts and Sciences, says with a\u00a0laugh.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, his partner on the expedition, Scott Gifford<\/a> \u2014 also an oceanographer from UNC<\/span> \u2014 examines heterotrophic bacteria. When describing these organisms, Gifford compares the ocean ecosystem to a farm. \u201cThe phytoplankton are the crop,\u201d he says. \u201cUltimately, the organic matter produced by those crops support us and other animals. In the ocean, heterotrophic bacteria are like the insects; they consume that organic matter. If they consume a lot of it, that means less food available to support animals higher in the food web such as fish and marine\u00a0mammals.\u201d<\/p>\n Scientists call this process the \u201cmicrobial loop,\u201d and Marchetti and Gifford are particularly interested in this one because the waters surrounding the Gal\u00e1pagos are warmer than normal. El Ni\u00f1o has arrived. Every five to eight years, this climate anomaly throws the islands off balance for 12 to 15 months. Phytoplankton decrease, causing a disruption in the food supply. Small fish that eat the phytoplankton die off, and that cascades up the food chain. A surplus of rain boosts the terrestrial environment; land plants grow like wildfire and the bird populations become overwhelming.<\/p>\n Alive and\u00a0upwell<\/strong><\/p>\n On the ship deck, Marchetti squints as the Gal\u00e1pagos sun sets over the Pacific. He lifts a round, plastic sampling device \u2014 called a Niskin bottle \u2014 and connects it to a long steel cable attached to the ship. He flashes a thumbs down at Gifford, signaling the device is ready to go into the water. Using a simple cable-and-weight system, the bottle drops to various depths, collecting slightly different samples of water to compare the diversity, growth characteristics, and interactions of the phytoplankton and bacterial communities (called the marine microbiome) at those\u00a0depths.<\/p>\n Phytoplankton growth depends on available sunlight, temperature, and nutrient levels \u2014 the Gal\u00e1pagos Archipelago houses some of the most nutrient-rich waters on the\u00a0planet.<\/p>\n When strong winds blow across the ocean, surface water gets pushed away, causing cold nutrient-rich water to flow up from the deep ocean through a process called upwelling. \u201cThose nutrients fuel a lot of phytoplankton growth in that area,\u201d Marchetti says. \u201cAnd that cascades up the food web to support these very rich, charismatic organisms that live in the Gal\u00e1pagos \u2014 the fish, the sharks, the iguanas, the sea lions, the sea turtles, and of course, the\u00a0penguins.\u201d<\/p>\n When El Ni\u00f1o strikes, upwelling slows, so fewer nutrients make it to the surface, and the waters heat up. \u201cEl Ni\u00f1o can vary in severity,\u201d Marchetti says. \u201cSometimes it\u2019s mild, meaning a less drastic decrease in upwelling. But then you have ones that are incredibly strong \u2014 and they can last a lot longer and have a serious impact on the\u00a0Gal\u00e1pagos.\u201d<\/p>\n El Ni\u00f1o is strong this year \u2014 predicted to be one of the strongest on record. Parts of the Pacific are hotter than ever recorded in the last 25 years, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration\u2019s Climate Prediction Center. So it\u2019s important, more than ever perhaps, that researchers gain information from these events to help them predict what\u2019s going to happen as the earth continues to\u00a0warm.<\/p>\n Good things come in small\u00a0packages<\/strong><\/p>\n Gifford wedges himself into a three-foot space along the portside of the ship to monitor his water samples. He records data on a piece of paper slowly soaking through with rain. He chuckles. \u201cThis is the tightest space I\u2019ve ever worked\u00a0in.\u201d<\/p>\n Phytoplankton play a crucial role in the oceanic carbon cycle<\/a>. Through photosynthesis, they pull carbon from the atmosphere into the deep sea and give off oxygen. Heterotrophic bacteria, on the other hand, consume carbon. The balance between phytoplankton and bacteria is a critical factor for regulating the carbon cycle, which, in turn, affects the planet\u2019s temperature. Gifford measures the rate at which these microbes take up oxygen to figure out how much carbon they\u00a0consume.<\/p>\n He also searches for different types of heterotrophic bacteria to learn as much as he can about the diversity of these microbial communities within the Gal\u00e1pagos. \u201cWhat\u2019s cool about the Gal\u00e1pagos is you have all these different ocean currents coming together in a relatively small area,\u201d he says. \u201cBy going around the islands, you are sampling all these different types of ocean communities. And while they may all look the same under the microscope, the diversity of phytoplankton and bacteria in these communities is staggering, with hundreds to thousands of different species in a single liter of\u00a0seawater.\u201d<\/p>\n Gifford wants to know more about bacterial production so that scientists can predict how life across the globe will be affected during events like El Ni\u00f1o. \u201cThere are so many factors,\u201d he says, \u201cand it\u2019s those factors we tried to measure and integrate into a bigger understanding of the\u00a0ecosystem.\u201d<\/p>\n Connection and\u00a0collaboration<\/strong><\/p>\n While Marchetti and Gifford collected water samples on-board the ship, 10 other researchers worked on their own projects. \u201cThe other researchers on the expedition observed the other side of the food web,\u201d Marchetti says. \u201cWe hope to, eventually, combine our data with theirs to better understand how the base of the food web influences the\u00a0top.\u201d<\/p>\n Researchers from the Universidad San Francisco de Quito (USFQ<\/span>) examined sea lions, seaweed, sea turtles, and iguanas. Investigators from the Gal\u00e1pagos Science Center<\/a> \u2014 a collaboration between Carolina and USFQ<\/span> \u2014 also studied the rate of ingested plastics in marine animals and birds through collecting plastics and taking samples from various species around the islands. Six staff members from the Gal\u00e1pagos National Park Service also joined the expedition to observe iguanas and search for insects that may have been introduced to the\u00a0islands.<\/p>\n The Gal\u00e1pagos can act as a laboratory for predicting what happens when water gets warmer here, and in other parts of the world. \u201cEven off the coast of North Carolina, there are changes in the water related to El Ni\u00f1o,\u201d Marchetti says. \u201cOur understanding of how El Ni\u00f1o influences the base of the food web is not just unique to the Gal\u00e1pagos \u2014 it translates to the rest of the\u00a0world.\u201d<\/p>\n Both Marchetti and Gifford hope to return in the spring, during El Ni\u00f1o\u2019s peak, to collect more samples \u2014 and, ideally, again in the future to observe the La Ni\u00f1a event, which typically follows an El Ni\u00f1o and results in cooler-than-normal water temperatures around the islands. \u201cWe want to learn how it will influence organisms in other parts of the ocean, and how we can use this information to help manage and protect the Gal\u00e1pagos National Park,\u201d Marchetti\u00a0says.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are on the brink,\u201d Gifford says. \u201cWe are just at the beginning of understanding these microbes in the environment. It\u2019s such an exciting time for biology. Research like this allows us to look at the incredible biodiversity within the ocean and learn more about the marine microbiome. And, at the same time, we can really understand how those communities are impacting our\u00a0planet.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Adrian Marchetti is an assistant professor in the Department of Marine Sciences in the College of Arts and Sciences at UNC<\/span>-Chapel\u00a0Hill.<\/em><\/p>\n Scott Gifford is an assistant professor in the Department of Marine Sciences in the College of Arts and Sciences at UNC<\/span>-Chapel Hill and the Sewell Family Foundation Fellow. To contact Gifford or for more information on his research, follow @giffsm on\u00a0Twitter.<\/em><\/p>\n The Gal\u00e1pagos Science Center, located on Isla San Cristobal, is a joint effort between UNC<\/span>-Chapel Hill and the Universidad San Francisco de Quito in Ecuador. The goal of the center is to promote science and education that will help protect the fragile island ecosystems of the Gal\u00e1pagos and enhance the lives of their\u00a0inhabitants.<\/em><\/p>\n Story<\/a> by Alyssa LaFaro, video<\/a> by Mary Lide Parker, <\/em>Endeavors magazine<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" To better understand the severity of this year\u2019s El Ni\u00f1o, UNC oceanographers traveled to one of the hardest hit places \u2014 the Gal\u00e1pagos Islands.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":12593,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center 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