Index >> Microbial Ecology of Different Ecosystems>> Marine Ecosystem Downwelling

Biota of the Sea
The marine environment is subjected to many changes including change in pressure, light intensity, turbidity, dissolved salts, etc. Based on these factors bacteria in the marine environment can be categorised into three groups:

Barotolerant They grow best at normal atmospheric pressure but can grow between 0-400 atm.

As with freshwater environment, the uppermost layer of the marine, ecosphere is the surface tension layer, where the marine ecosphere interfaces with the atmosphere. The seawater-air interface is the habitat for the pleuston, the marine equivalent of the neuston, which includes bacterial and algal inhabitants. Pseudomonas and various pigmented genera such as Erythrobacter, Erythromicrobium, Protominobacter and Roseobacter are major bacterial population. A higher proportion of pleuston bacteria have been reported to utilise carbohydrates than do bacteria in the underlying water. Population of primary producers, including cyanobacteria, diatoms and Phaeophycophyta are sometimes found in the pleuston layer.