UV and Phytoplankton

[randy holmes-farley]

I just read a report that Patrick Neale of the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center has found that that the increase in UV coming through the ozone hole in antarctica is causing a decline in the photosynthesis of marine phytoplankton.

Has anyone taken the time to see how the "excess" UV coming from some mh lamps compares to the "excess" UV coming through the ozone hole? Do we think it might be causing a decrease in photosynthesis in our tanks?

Thanks

 

[SPC]

Intresting point Randy, I don't have any idea but I would like to bump this back up yo see if others have an opinion.
Steve

 

[monkeyboy]

Very good question. I think zooxanthalle have a much better life than free floating marine phytoplankton because they are housed up in coral tissue. They must get some degree of protection from UV by the surrounding tissue, not to mention the coral pigments. But then again, not all corals have lots of pigments to protect them, so the question remains...

So how is this guy measuring the rate of photosynthesis? Directly or indirectly thru byproducts in the water? Maybe it's just killing off some, and maybe i have no clue.

 

[Anonymous]

Excellent point, monkeyboy. A great wealth of coral species (and even adaptations exhibited within species) may produce mycosporin-like pigments that can "protect" zooxanthellae, which lay in vacuoles in the inner cell layer endodermis, behind the first cell layer, the epidermis, from photosynthetic-efficiency compromising UV emissions... but, as far as I know, no maximum "safe" amounts of UV that allow symbiont photosynthesis to remain at an ideal efficiency are known.

Thanks to Randy for bringing interesting info to the forefront of attention.

 

[Anonymous]

moving up for further comment.