{"id":12270,"date":"2024-10-17T18:52:23","date_gmt":"2024-10-17T18:52:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.golive.clarku.edu\/news\/2024\/10\/17\/biologist-wins-56-million-nsf-career-grant-to-study-how-iron-helps-the-world-breathe\/"},"modified":"2025-04-07T09:05:58","modified_gmt":"2025-04-07T13:05:58","slug":"biologist-wins-1-5-6-million-nsf-career-grant-to-study-how-iron-helps-the-world-breathe","status":"publish","type":"story","link":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2024\/10\/17\/biologist-wins-1-5-6-million-nsf-career-grant-to-study-how-iron-helps-the-world-breathe\/","title":{"rendered":"Biologist wins $1.56 million NSF CAREER grant to study how iron helps the world breathe"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n

Professor Nathan Ahlgren\u2019s marine microbial ecology research focuses on key producer of earth\u2019s oxygen<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Biology Professor Nathan Ahlgren has won a five-year, $1.56 million National Science Foundation Early Career Development (NSF CAREER) grant<\/a> to investigate how iron nourishes and shapes the adaptation of Synechococcus, <\/em>one of the most abundant phytoplankton in the ocean and a key driver to the photosynthesis that generates as much as 15 percent of the oxygen we breathe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Synechococcus<\/em> is a type of marine cyanobacteria, formerly known as blue-green algae, that \u201cform an important foundation of life in the oceans,\u201d according to Ahlgren<\/a>. At the bottom of the ocean\u2019s food chain, \u201cthey produce organic material and oxygen, just like plants on land do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more than two decades, the microbial ecologist\u2019s research has focused on Synechococcus <\/em>and its sister genus, Prochlorococcus, <\/em>which together, as the most abundant marine cyanobacteria, carry out about 25 percent of the photosynthesis in the ocean. These cyanobacteria are incredibly important to sustaining life on earth, he explains, \u201cbecause half of all photosynthesis occurs in the ocean.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"water
Samples of water containing cyanobacteria from Naragansett Bay in Rhode Island. (Photo by Steven King, university photographer)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Yet, like all living things, cyanobacteria need iron to survive, Ahlgren says. For that important reason, scientists have focused on iron levels in the ocean, where phytoplankton play a crucial role in \u201ccontrolling the amount of photosynthesis and flow of carbon dioxide on our planet,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In about 30 percent of the ocean, phytoplankton growth is limited by a lack of iron, a phenomenon that has been well studied, according to Ahlgren. Less studied is phytoplankton\u2019s response to low, medium, or high iron levels in the rest of the ocean, he explains, and how the variability or stability of iron conditions affects phytoplankton populations, including Synechococcus<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe hope to set the context for understanding what\u2019s happening right now so we can start to make predictions for the future,\u201d Ahlgren says. \u201cIf we know how iron conditions are going to change, and if iron is going to be more variable or more stable, then we might know how cyanobacteria could respond.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne classic example is the winds from the Sahara in Africa that blow dust into the Atlantic. When that happens, the phytoplankton are exposed to dust containing iron, and they just go wild. They bloom.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

During photosynthesis, phytoplankton remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere \u2014 like forests on land, these microbial blooms sequester carbon, which is key to helping curb global warming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Forecasting the future health of phytoplankton therefore contributes to scientists\u2019 broader understanding of climate change, according to Ahlgren.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cClimate is always present in the background of our research,\u201d he adds, \u201ceven if it\u2019s not the direct focus.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Scientists have studied the impacts of weather patterns that increase the amount of iron in the ocean, enriching the phytoplankton and leading to more carbon sequestration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne classic example is the winds from the Sahara in Africa that blow dust into the Atlantic,\u201d he says. \u201cWhen that happens, the phytoplankton are exposed to dust containing iron, and they just go wild. They bloom.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Nathan
Biology Professor Nathan Ahlgren (back row, third from right) and his lab group. (Photo by Steven King, university photographer)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Over the past several years<\/a>, Ahlgren has investigated how cyanobacteria interact with their environment and with other organisms, especially the viruses that infect them. He has collaborated with marine virologist Marcie Marston of Roger Williams University, using water samples gathered over a decade from Narragansett Bay in Rhode Island. That study has been funded by $1.1 million in grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For his new NSF CAREER grant, Ahlgren is partnering with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute; Duke University\u2019s Marine Lab; and Roger Williams University to collect phytoplankton samples from a wide variety of ocean ecosystems. Shafer Belisle, a Ph.D. student working in Ahlgren\u2019s lab<\/a>, has conducted preliminary research for the project, collecting water samples from the Pacific.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The grant supports science education and inquiry for a wide variety of students and scholars, from fifth graders studying ecology at a local elementary school to Clark undergraduate and graduate students and a postdoctoral fellow. It also funds 10 undergraduate researchers over five years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ahlgren has involved students in his lab \u2014 and extended his research to include communities in Massachusetts \u2014 ever since he arrived at Clark in 2017.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In partnership with the city of Worcester, he has led efforts, alongside biology colleagues  Philip Bergmann<\/a> and Javier Tabima Restrepo<\/a> and Clark undergraduates, to monitor the health of the city\u2019s waterways<\/a> and investigate the impact of urbanization on local aquatic ecosystems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His students also worked with him to research freshwater microbial communities <\/a>in Cape Cod\u2019s kettle ponds and the health of Walden Pond, made famous by Henry David Thoreau.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s important,\u201d Ahlgren says, \u201cfor students to see how their research can connect to bigger things like helping to protect ecosystems.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Image at top of story:<\/strong> \u201cFrom space, we can see a swirling brown mass [at right in the satellite image]<\/em> making its way across the Atlantic \u2014 dust from the Sahara Desert \u2014 the largest hot desert in the world. It\u2019s a normal phenomenon. Every year, winds carry millions of tons of dust from North Africa, usually during spring and summer in the Northern Hemisphere,\u201d according to NASA\u2019s Goddard Space Flight Center, which provided the satellite photo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Professor Nathan Ahlgren\u2019s marine microbial ecology research focuses on key producer of earth\u2019s oxygen<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":12271,"template":"","meta":{"story_color":"#525250","story_headerImg":12271,"section_label":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[241,227],"displayed_author":[242],"featured":[495],"topic":[244,131,150,160,209,162],"class_list":["post-12270","story","type-story","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-environment-sustainability","category-science-technology","displayed_author-meredith-woodward-king","featured-research","topic-biology","topic-climate-change","topic-faculty","topic-faculty-research","topic-grants","topic-research"],"yoast_head":"\nBiologist wins $1.56 million NSF CAREER grant to study how iron helps the world breathe | ClarkU News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link 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