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Celebrating the Little Ones

May 30, 2008

WHOI microbiologist John Waterbury examines phytoplankton samples in his lab in the Stanley W. Watson Biogeochemistry Building. Today Waterbury is joining MIT biologist Penny Chisholm and WHOI biologist Robert Olson at ProchlorococcusFest, a “science bash” to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the discovery of the marine microbe. Prochlorococcus is one of the smallest and most abundant photosynthetic organisms in the oceans; nearly 100 million can live in a quart of seawater. The microbes are known to play a key role in the ocean carbon cycle and, hence, climate regulation. Chisholm, Olson, and Waterbury were key members of the research team that discovered the microbe and first described it in the journal Nature in 1988. (Photo by Tom Kleindinst, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)