The importance of marine microbes

The microbes are important for all life on our planet because they form the basis of all food webs on Earth. This especially refers to marine microbes because oceans account for more than 90% of Earth's biosphere.

Marine microbes are tiny microorganisms that can only be seen under a microscope. Our oceans contain countless number of microbes. The scientists say that just one litre of seawater contains up to a billion microbes.

Marine microbes recycle vital elements such as carbon and nitrogen, produce more than half of the entire global oxygen supply and, in doing so, sink a large proportion of man-made carbon dioxide (CO₂), the greenhouse gas that is believed to be the main driving force of ongoing global warming phenomenon.

The scientists are well aware of how important microbes are but their knowledge about microbes is still very limited. The modern science still doesn't know answers to very important questions on how many different types of microbes reside in our oceans and what is the role of each of them.

The science of microbiology is developing rapidly, driven not only by technological and scientific development but also because of different issues such as climate change and over-exploitation of marine resources so hopefully in years to come we'll learn lot more information about microorganisms that live in our oceans and seas.

The governments need to ensure larger funds for more research in this area because marine microbes play key role in sustaining entire life on our planet.

The scientists have just started understanding the important environmental roles that microbes play in our oceans and seas, and they hope that in future the new, more comprehensive studies will give them lot more answers about all the important functions reserved for these tiny organisms.