Microbial dietary preference and interactions affect the export of lipids to the deep ocean.

Lipids comprise a significant fraction of sinking organic matter in the ocean and play a crucial role in the carbon cycle. Despite this, our understanding of the processes that control lipid degradation is limited. We combined nanolipidomics and imaging to study the bacterial degradation of diverse algal lipid droplets and found that bacteria isolated from marine particles exhibited distinct dietary preferences, ranging from selective to promiscuous degraders.

RotoBOD─Quantifying Oxygen Consumption by Suspended Particles and Organisms.

Sinking or floating is the natural state of planktonic organisms and particles in the ocean. Simulating these conditions is critical when making measurements, such as respirometry, because they allow the natural exchange of substrates and products between sinking particles and water flowing around them and prevent organisms that are accustomed to motion from changing their metabolism. We developed a rotating incubator, the RotoBOD (named after its capability to rotate and determine biological oxygen demand, BOD), that uniquely enables automated oxygen measurements in small volumes while keeping the samples in their natural state of suspension.