MARINE ECOSYSTEM
BY:
SOFIA BERNAL
MARIA JOSE AGUDELO
ANDREA BOHORQUEZ
13/09/12
COLEGIO MARYMOUNT
SCIENCE
JOHANA CEPEDA
LIFE IN THE OCEAN:
The ocean covers almost three-fourths of the Earth’s surface, and holds both the
largest animals and some of the smallest organisms of the earth.
Marine ecosystems are sharped by abiotic factors. These factors include water
temperature, water depth, and the amount of sunlight that passes into the water.
MARINE COMMUNITIES:
Nearly three-fourths of the Earth’s surface is covered by ocean, which consist of
the three major kinds of marine communities
Shallow oceans waters: The zone of shallow water is small in area, but compared
with other parts of the ocean, it is inhabited by large numbers of species. The
seashore between high and low tide, called the intertidal zone, is home to many
species of marine invertebrates. Coral reef communities, the world’s great fisheries
are located in the coastal zones of cooler waters, where nutrients washed out from
land support huge numbers of fishes.
Surface of the open sea: Drifting freely in the upper waters of the ocean is a
diverse community of plankton, composed of bacteria, algae, fish larvae, and many
small invertebrate animals. Fishes, whales, and invertebrates such as jelly-fishes
feed on plankton. And larger fishes and birds, in turn, feed on some of these
animals. Photosynthetic plankton (algae such as diatoms and some bacteria) that
form the base of this food chain account for about 40% of all the photosynthesis
that takes place on Earth. Because light penetrates water only to the depth of
about 100 m (328 ft), this rich community is confined to the ocean’s surface.
Ocean depths: In the deepest waters of the sea, the marine community lives in
the total darkness, in the cold, and under great pressure. Despite what seem like
hostile conditions, the deep ocean supports a diverse community of bizarre
invertebrates and fishes. This includes great squids and angler fishes that attract
prey with projections from their head that emit light. On the ocean floor, at an
average depth of more than 3 km (1.9 mi), researchers have found an unexpected
abundance of species, a diversity that rivals the tropical rain forest.
Marine habitats
Coral reefs provide marine
habitats for tube sponges,
which in turn become marine
habitats for fishes
Littoral zone
Intertidal zone
Estuaries
Kelp forests
Coral reefs
Ocean banks
Continental shelf
Neritic zone
Straits
Pelagic zone
Oceanic zone
Seamounts
Hydrothermal vents
Cold seeps
Demersal zone
Benthic zone
Marine topography:
These shapes are along the coastlines, but they occur also in significant ways
underwater. The effectiveness is partially defined by these shapes, including the
way they interact with and shape ocean currents, and the way sunlight diminishes
when these landforms occupy increasing depths.
Marine topographies include coastal and oceanic landforms ranging from
coastal estuaries and shorelines to continental shelves and coral reefs. Further out
in the open ocean, they include underwater and deep sea features such as ocean
rises and seamounts. The submerged surface has mountainous features, including
a globe-spanning mid-ocean ridge system, as well as undersea volcanoes, oceanic
trenches, submarine, canyons, oceanic plateaus and abyssal plains.
The mass of the oceans is approximately 1.35×1018 metric tons, or about 1/4400 of
the total mass of the Earth. The oceans cover an area of 3.618×10 8 km2 with a
mean depth of 3,682 m, resulting in an estimated volume of 1.332×109 km3.
Vocabulary:
Plankton: The mass of mostly microscopic organisms that float or drift freely in the
waters of aquatic (freshwater and marine) environments.
Estuary: an area where fresh water from rivers mixes with salt water from the
ocean
Food chain:
THE CLIMATE ON THE MARINE ECOSYSTEM:
The climate on the marine ecosystem depends on the salinity, ocean circulation
and on the exchange of heat, and it is dividing in some season that are:
Wet season:
This season occurs on the period were the atmosphere is not stable, on this period
of time the islands that are most affected are the Jamaica and Grenada, this
season is mostly common on July and September.
Dry season:
This season occurs when the atmosphere is stable, and a big difference between
the wet season is that it docent rain as much as it rain on the wet season.
The rainfall is 1000 to over 1500 mm, and the temperature is between the 25 to 35.
the temperature also depends on the location, the water that is deep is colder than
the water that is near the surface, some animals need to live in a specific
temperature on the water because sometimes the food that they eat are on this
zones and if the animals go to another temperature there is no food so the die.
FLORA AND FAUNA OF THE MARINE ECOSYSTEM:
Coral reefs:
Coral reefs have three types that are: barrel fringing, and atoll
fringing reef: it is form on the shoreline of the new tropical island, the animals that
live on these reef are so few because these animals can on live on warms
temperature, so the coral reef is from along the new island and it is called as the
fringing reef.
barrier reef: it is forms in the when the oceanic island begins to sink on the Earth
crust, when the earth crust sinks the coral reef continuous to grow upwards, the
lower part of the reef is composed by the calcium carbonate of the skeletons left by
the reef building coral.
atoll reef: it is form when the oceanic island sinks below the surface of the ocean
but the coral reef continuous to grow up, it is usually a circular shape but it have a
broken part.
The coral reefs are made of polyps and algae that feed like plants.
ABIOTIC AND BIOTIC FACOTRS OF MARINE ECOSYSTEM:
Biotic: All marine animals and plants. Dolphins, fish, stingrays, starfish, shellfish,
shrimps, seaweed, seagrasses, phytoplankton, zooplankton, sea urchins, sea
cucumbers, nudibranchs, cunjevoi, coral, sea sponges, etc
Abiotic: All minerals, chemicals and substances. Water, rock, gasses, grains,
water particls, wind, current, precipitation, underwater caves, sand
OVERVIEW:
In contrast to terrestrial habitats, marine habitats are shifting and ephemeral.
Swimming organisms find areas by the edge of a continental shelf a good habitat,
but only while upwellings bring nutrient rich water to the surface. Shellfish find
habitat on sandy beaches, but storms, tides and currents mean their habitat
continually reinvents itself.
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temperature – is affected by geographical latitude, ocean currents, weather, the
discharge of rivers, and by the presence of hydrothermal vents orcold seeps
sunlight – photosynthetic processes depend on how deep and turbid the water
is
nutrients – are transported by ocean currents to different marine habitats
from land runoff, or by upwellings from the deep sea, or they sink though the
sea as marine snow
salinity – varies, particularly in estuaries or near river deltas, or by hydrothermal
vents
dissolved gases – oxygen levels in particular, can be increased by wave
actions and decreased during algal blooms
acidity – this is partly to do with dissolved gases above, since the acidity of the
ocean is largely controlled by how much carbon dioxide is in the water.
turbulence – ocean waves, fast currents and the agitation of water affect the
nature of habitats
cover – the availability of cover such as the adjacency of the sea bottom, or the
presence of floating objects
the occupying organisms themselves – since organisms modify their habitats
by the act of occupying them, and some, like corals, kelp, mangroves and
seagrasses, create further habitats for other organisms.
BIOMAS:
Producer
swamps and marshes
Biomass
productivity
(gC/m²/yr)
2,500
Ref
Total
area
(million
km²)
Ref
Total
production
(billion
tonnes
C/yr)
Comment
[14]
Includes
Producer
Biomass
productivity
(gC/m²/yr)
Ref
Total
area
(million
km²)
Ref
Total
production
(billion
tonnes
C/yr)
Comment
freshwater
coral reefs
2,000
[14]
algal beds
2,000
[14]
river estuaries
1,800
[14]
open ocean
BIBLOGRAPHY:
125
[14][16]
0.28
311
[15]
0.56
39
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http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/O/Oceans.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marine_habitats#Marine_topography
http://www.ehow.com/info_8425169_characteristics-marine-biome.html
http://www.marinebio.net/marinescience/04benthon/crform.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropical_marine_climate
http://www.windows2universe.org/earth/Water/marine_ecology.html
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_are_the_abiotic_and_biotic_in_ocean_e
cosystem
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_are_some_abiotic_and_biotic_factors_f
or_a_marine_biome