Would Plants Deep In The Ocean Have The Same Photosynthetic Pigments As Plants That Live Close To The Surface?

Let me know if so or if not

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This entry was posted on Friday, January 29th, 2010 at 11:51 am and is filed under Pigment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.

2 Responses to “Would Plants Deep In The Ocean Have The Same Photosynthetic Pigments As Plants That Live Close To The Surface?”

  1. All algae use chlorophyll a but they vary their accessory pigments. Maximum chlorophyll a depth varies with light penetration. Light penetrates down to about 200 meters with enough energy to drive photosynthesis making this is the realm phytoplankton occupies. Chlorophyll d, chlorophyll b, chlorophyll c, & carotenoids extend the organisms optical range at depth.
    Chlorophyll d absorbs the farthest red light range of all pigments but still requires chlorophyll a to accept the energy. http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/bs…http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache:Xuz…
    Accessory pigments used with chlorophyll a at depthhttp://www.int-res.com/articles/meps/113…http://www.jstor.org/pss/2670703
    After 200 m only 1% of the light penetrates, to little to support photosynthesis. This is referred to as aphotic or lightless but some species of multicellular algae do anchor this deep.http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/ab…http://www.jstor.org/pss/2834873

  2. No, the deeper plants would have photosynthetic pigments that are capable of capturing the light that penetrates deeper. This is because part of the light spectrum is captured in the surface water, so deeper algae and other plants would have different a phytochrome than the plants that grow at the surface.