Phytoplankton that harvest sunlight in the world’s oceans make more heat than food, a new study finds.
The microscopic marine organisms, which serve as an important food source in the ocean, use photosynthesis to turn sunlight into cellular fuel. But nearly twice as much of the sunlight energy captured by phytoplankton in the ocean is released as heat than is used to make food, researchers report January 7 in Science. The finding suggests that phytoplankton don’t photosynthesize as efficiently as researchers had thought.