Oceans that cover more than 70 % of our Earth are mysteriously turning blue to green. This is revealed by a study by B. B. Cael from the UK's National Oceanography Centre.
In their research of 20 years of data taken from the NASA Aqua satellite, it was revealed that 56 per cent of the ocean water had changed its colour from blue to green, especially in the southern Indian Ocean near the equator. The spectroradiometer named MODIS aboard Aqua satellite the researchers analysed data for two decades from 2002 to 2022.
The responsible factor for the change in colour is phytoplankton communities in the ocean. These marine organism plays a vital role in the green colour as they release carbon dioxide that results in the rise of phyto blooms. These phytoplankton contain the green pigment chlorophyll. And their presence in the ocean makes it look green.
B B Cael, a scientist at the National Oceanography Centre in Southampton in the UK talked about the green ocean and said, "The colour itself is not something that's easy to describe with human language or that you can even see that well," he further added, "Instead, this might be something that a mantis shrimp or a butterfly could see."
Cael is a lead author of the study that has provided the data of NASA satellites for two decades of observation it did on the ocean colour changes.
He also talked about how human activities impact oceans and mentioned in his statement, "This gives additional evidence of how human activities affect life on earth over a huge spatial extent. It's another way that humans are affecting the biosphere.”
Scientists are observing the phytoplankton growth and their communities as they might be responsible for climate change. So they are tracking their chlorophyll ratio on how blue viruses green surface.
There is a report named (European State of the Climate report) published in April 2024, by the European Union's Copernicus Climate Service that has provided data on the changes in the ocean.
There is an upcoming mission by NASA where the PACE satellite mission will be launched in 2024 for the further observation of the phytoplankton diversity that will give insights on their growth and possibly scientists may be able to find a solution through data and research on how to slow down the increment of these communities in ocean
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