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It's a well-known fact that phytoplankton play a huge role in managing Earth's climate by drawing down CO2 for photosynthesis every year. The new study suggests another fascinating way that these little critters are shaping our planet—by making it a tad brighter. Averaged over the year, the researchers find that phytoplankton reflect an extra 4 watts of incoming solar radiation per square meter in the Southern Ocean skies.
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The new study took a closer look at what else could be making the clouds more reflective. Using ocean biology models and data on cloud droplet concentrations, the team identified marine life as the likely culprit. Phytoplankton emit gases such as dimethyl sulfide (the stuff that gives the ocean its distinctly sulfurous smell), which, once airborne, can also help condense water droplets. What's more, summertime plankton blooms form a bubbly scum of tiny organic particles that are easily whipped up into the air. Taken together, these two biological pathways double the number of tiny droplets in Southern Ocean skies during the summer.
This plus the work in recent years about extremophiles, specifically endoliths, have radically enlarged the established biosphere and have exciting implications for the existence of life elsewhere in our solar system.
Original Submission
(Score: 3, Funny) by aristarchus on Tuesday July 21 2015, @07:29AM
As an astronomer, and one who has been at it for a long time, I have to say that bioluminescince is the least of our problems. Back when I was a boy on Samos, you could see the Milky Way every night when there were no clouds in the sky. And this continued for a very long time. Consider that Messier could observe the night sky from a Hotel in downtown Paris, and see things with a tiny telescope that are very difficult for amateur astronomers to find today. It was only with the invention of electric light that we started to experience "light pollution". And It has spread. People scared of the dark.
So lay off the little beasties, and put the blame where it belongs. And turn off your damn lights! I am trying to observe Messier 15, you insensitive bastards!
(Score: 1) by jdavidb on Tuesday July 21 2015, @01:56PM
ⓋⒶ☮✝🕊 Secession is the right of all sentient beings
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 21 2015, @02:11PM
This isn't about bioluminescence. The claim here is that there are microorganisms that directly turn CO2 into albedo.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Tuesday July 21 2015, @11:45PM
Thanks, I stand corrected! But still, if they are brightening the sky from the outside, (this is what threw me), then they are darkening the sky from the inside, even at night. So, still bad news for astronomy?