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Taking Apart Brown Tide Algae

Taking Apart Brown Tide Algae

In the summer, a single-celled marine algae species often causes “brown tides” in estuaries along the U.S. East Coast, killing seagrass, decimating shellfish, and costing local economies millions of […]

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Harmful Algae & Red Tide Research

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WHOI scientists Dennis McGillicuddy and Ruoying He created a computer simulation of the historic 2005 toxic algae bloom in New England. Red denotes high algae concentrations; blue the lowest. Algal cells germinated from cyst beds in the Bay of Fundy and along the Maine coast. They were swept south and west by currents. McGillicuddy and He entered a range of factors into their model: the speeds and directions of ocean currents, water temperature and salinity, winds, surface heat exchanges, tides, river runoff, and the distribution and behavior of cells in the water and in seafloor sediments. (Data visualization by Ruoying He and Dennis McGillicuddy, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)

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Growing marine algae

Growing marine algae

In experimental tanks at WHOI, guest student Tyler Goepfert grows different species of marine algae to test which might be best suited for harvesting and converting into biofuels. Goepfert is […]

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Sunset for an Algae Bloom

Sunset for an Algae Bloom

A sediment corer dangles in the evening sun before being lowered to the seafloor in the Gulf of Maine. Researchers from WHOI, NOAA, and several institutions sampled the muck […]

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Featured Image: Teeming with Life

Teeming with Life

A close-up view of an Acropora coral reveals small individual coral polyps (the small, button-like dots), but a microscope is necessary to study the millions of inhabitants inside the […]

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Above the Reef Flat

Above the Reef Flat

Kan-Min of the Dongsha Atoll Research Station steers a research vessel over Dongsha’s coral reef in the South China Sea, where former MIT-WHOI Joint Program student Tom DeCarlo conducted […]

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Biofouled

Biofouled

A thick coat of young barnacles covers this orange float after it had been deployed in the Chukchi Sea north of Alaska for 13 months. Ship hulls, instruments, buoys, and rigging […]

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Pollution Fighters?

Pollution Fighters?

Researchers from WHOI Sea Grant and the Cape Cod Cooperative Extension analyzed wild and farmed oysters and quahogs to see how much nitrogen the shellfish can store in their […]

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Coral Bleaching

Coral Bleaching

This coral’s stark white color indicates that it is stressed. Corals host symbiotic algae that produce food for corals and also give corals their vibrant color. When ocean waters […]

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