Scripps Oceanography Research pegs ID of red tide killer

While the RCA cluster’s role in the marine ecosystem is not known, Azam, a distinguished professor of marine microbiology in the Marine Biology Research Division at Scripps, said harmful algal blooms are an important problem and consideration must be given to the fact that red tide dinoflagellates don’t exist in isolation of other parts of the marine food web. Bacteria and other parts of the “microbial loop” feed on the organic matter released by the dinoflagellates and in turn the dinoflagellates are known to feed on other cells (including bacteria) when their nutrients run out.

Dinoflagellate interactions with highly abundant and genetically diverse bacteria in the sea have the potential to both enhance and suppress bloom intensity—but this important subject is only beginning to be explored.

“The newly identified role of RCA cluster is a good illustration of the need to understand the multifarious mechanisms by which microbes influence the functioning of the marine ecosystems,” Azam said.

“This type of discovery is helping us understand algal bloom dynamics and the interactions among the components of planktonic ecosystems in ways that we’d imagined but previously lacked evidence,” said Franks.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s ECOHAB (Ecology of Harmful Algal Blooms) program funded the research.

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Scripps Institution of Oceanography, at UC San Diego, is one of the oldest, largest and most important centers for global science research and graduate training in the world. The National Research Council has ranked Scripps first in faculty quality among oceanography programs nationwide. Now in its second century of discovery, the scientific scope of the institution has grown to include biological, physical, chemical, geological, geophysical and atmospheric studies of the earth as a system. Hundreds of research programs covering a wide range of scientific areas are under way today in 65 countries. The institution has a staff of about 1,300, and annual expenditures of approximately $155 million from federal, state and private sources. Scripps operates one of the largest U.S. academic fleets with four oceanographic research ships and one research platform for worldwide exploration.