AquaParadox: The Diversity of Planktonic Microorganisms

The collection of images and videos was originally developed as an outreach effort of a multi-partner research project called Aquaparadox (from Hutchinson__s __Paradox of the Plankton"). In the project we examined morphological, genetic and physiological diversity in common coastal protist morpho-species, that is morphologically-defined species. Subjects of study included a wide range of protists: 1) grazers of the sea - tintinnid ciliates, 2) autotrophs, that is __plant__ or phytoplankton forms- the dinoflagellate Ceratium and the small flagellate Micromonas and 3) the dinoflagellate parasite Syndiniales. The project was financed from 2008 through 2011 and involved 4 laboratories: The Microbial Ecology Group of the Laboratoire d__Océanographie de Villefranche (alas, a now defunct group), The Oceanic Plankton Group in Roscoff, The Microbial Diversity and Evolution Group of the University of Paris XI (Paris-Sud) and the Virtual Biology Laboratory of the University of Nice Sophia-Antipolis. Financial support was from the ANR and Pôle Mer PACA (France). http://aquaparadox.obs-vlfr.fr/