Evolution
Large-scale changes that result in the formation of new species.
What is macroevolution?
Ancient Pacific navigators used stars, waves, and birds to find their way.
Who were the Polynesians?
Order the ocean zones from shallowest to deepest.
What is Epipelagic → Mesopelagic → Bathypelagic → Abyssopelagic → Hadalpelagic?
Algae type with chlorophyll pigments found in shallow waters.
What is green algae?
This process drives ocean circulation by differences in temperature and salinity, helps distribute heat around the planet, and is influenced by changes in climate.
What is thermohaline circulation?
Fossils showing intermediate traits between species and evolutionary links.
What are transitional fossils?
First to circumnavigate the globe.
Who was Ferdinand Magellan?
How light, temperature, and pressure change with depth.
Light decreases, temperature drops, and pressure increases with depth.
Algae type with fucoxanthin pigment found in cooler waters.
What is brown algae (e.g., kelp)?
How phytoplankton affect the carbon cycle.
They absorb CO₂ and transfer it to the deep ocean (biological carbon pump).
What is background extinction?
Known as the “Father of Modern Oceanography” for mapping ocean currents.
Who was Matthew Maury?
The system that uses sound waves to measure depth.
What is SONAR?
Algae type with phycoerythrin pigment found in deep tropical waters.
What is red algae?
Burst of phytoplankton caused by excess nutrients in the ocean.
Harmful Algae Bloom
How water first appeared on Earth.
What is delivery by comets/asteroids and outgassing from volcanic activity?
This naturalist studied ocean currents and inspired future explorers.
Who was Alexander von Humboldt?
Order of ocean floor features from coast to deep.
What is Continental Shelf → Continental Slope → Continental Rise → Abyssal Plain?
The base of the marine food web.
What are phytoplankton?
Difference between ROVs and AUVs.
ROVs are remotely controlled by humans, AUVs are pre-programmed and autonomous.
The first life forms and where they appeared.
What are simple, single-cell microbes (bacteria/archaea) found in oceans or hydrothermal vents?
The first global oceanographic expedition that discovered deep-sea life and mapped the seafloor.
What was the HMS Challenger Expedition?
The process that brings nutrient-rich water to the surface.
What is upwelling?
The difference between holoplankton and meroplankton.
Holoplankton stay planktonic their whole lives; meroplankton are planktonic only as larvae.
The submersible that explored hydrothermal vents and the Titanic.
ALVIN