Category: Dinoflagellates
Articles on anything dinoflagellate.
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The sorcerer’s apprentices of photosynthesis
This is the third part of my series on Dinophysis. If you didn’t read the first and second part, go read them and come back! We’ve now seen how Dinophysis was finally cultivated in the lab: by feeding it with its prey, the ciliate Mesodinium rubrum. Both of these microbes thrive by acquiring chloroplasts from foreign origin.…
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The gingerbread house strategy
In these winter times, it is tempting to spend the evening sitting by the fire, reading old fairy tales. You’ve probably heard of Hansel and Gretel, a story of 2 children being lured into a gingerbread house by a cannibalistic witch? Well, today’s the day for some planktonic Hansel and Gretel. Meet the witch: Orbulina…
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The domestication of Dinophysis
This is the second part of my series on Dinophysis. If you didn’t read the first part, go read it, and come back! Taming the beast After the toxicity of Dinophysis was revealed, the incentives for establishing permanent cultures in laboratory conditions were high. Once mastered, lab cultures of microorganisms are a great asset for…
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A bloom of Alexandrium, from every angle
When I wrote last month’s post, I didn’t expect it to be relevant this soon, yet you will see that it is a fitting introduction for this one! A few days ago at the beginning of June, while scrutinising Sentinel-2 images of the Loire river turbid plume, my PhD supervisor spotted red patches in the…
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Toxic mussels in the time of paulownia flowers
A curious case of shellfish poisoning in Japan In the summer of 1976, coastal towns in Miyagi prefecture in northeastern Japan were faced with an unusual epidemic: 42 people presented symptoms of vomiting and diarrhea after they had eaten mussels. One year later, a similar outbreak occured, this time all along the eastern coast of…
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How big are dinoflagellate genomes?
When you begin working on dinoflagellates, you quickly learn that they have (very) big genomes. But how big really? Recently, I was preparing a presentation on dinoflagellates and I was faced with this question, so I investigated a bit. I found this great data visualisation by Tom White that plotted genome size in different groups…
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Phycoplankton 