Regions Exhibiting Decreased Phytoplankton Levels and Increased Sea Surface Temperatures

  • Released Thursday, October 8, 2009
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Throughout most of Earth's ocean, as the surface layer of the ocean warms, the water becomes less dense and forms a cap, rather than mixing down to allow cooler, nutrient-rich water to well up. Over time, areas with less mixing show reduced productivity and less phytoplankton. This data visualization highlights regions where a strong correlation between high sea surface temperatures and decreased phytoplankton productivity occurred from 1997-2006. For nearly a decade, the Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-View Sensor (SeaWiFS) has been making global observations of phytoplankton productivity. On December 6, 2006, NASA-funded scientists announced that warming sea surface temperatures over the past decade have caused a global decline in phytoplankton productivity.

This animation depicts a rotating Earth with highlighted areas marking the regions where a strong correlation between high sea surface temperatures and decreased phytoplankton productivity occurred.

Credits

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio. NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, The SeaWiFS Project and GeoEye, Scientific Visualization Studio. NOTE: All SeaWiFS images and data presented on this web site are for research and educational use only. All commercial use of SeaWiFS data must be coordinated with GeoEye (NOTE: In January 2013, DigitalGlobe and GeoEye combined to become one DigitalGlobe.).

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Related papers

Behrenfeld at. al., Nature 444, 752-755 (7 December 2006)

Behrenfeld at. al., Nature 444, 752-755 (7 December 2006)

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This page was originally published on Thursday, October 8, 2009.
This page was last updated on Wednesday, May 3, 2023 at 1:54 PM EDT.