The Mixoplankton Database (MDB): Diversity of photo-phago-trophic plankton in form, function, and distribution across the global ocean.

Protist plankton are major members of open-water marine food webs. Traditionally divided between phototrophic phytoplankton and phagotrophic zooplankton, recent research shows many actually combine phototrophy and phagotrophy in the one cell; these protists are the "mixoplankton." Under the mixoplankton paradigm, "phytoplankton" are incapable of phagotrophy (diatoms being exemplars), while "zooplankton" are incapable of phototrophy.

A three-dimensional mixotrophic model of Karlodinium veneficum blooms for a eutrophic estuary.

Blooms of dinoflagellate Karlodinium veneficum are widely distributed in estuarine and coastal waters and have been found to cause fish kills worldwide. K. veneficum has a mixed nutritional mode and relies on both photosynthesis and phagotrophy for growth; it is a mixotroph.

Metabolic and physiological changes in Prymnesium parvum when grown under, and grazing on prey of, variable nitrogen:phosphorus stoichiometry.

Mixotrophy is found in almost all classes of phytoplankton in a wide range of aquatic habitats ranging from oligotrophic to eutrophic marine and freshwater systems. Few studies have addressed how the nutritional status of the predator and/or the prey affects mixotrophic metabolism despite the realization that mixotrophy is important ecologically. Laboratory experiments were conducted to examine changes in growth rates and physiological states of the toxic haptophyte Prymnesium parvum when fed Rhodomonas salina of varying nutritional status.

The Genetic Diversity of and Associated Cryptophytes.

Ciliates from the genus are globally distributed in marine and freshwater ecosystems and may possess either heterotrophic or mixotrophic nutritional modes. Members of the species complex photosynthesize by sequestering and maintaining organelles from cryptophyte prey, and under certain conditions form periodic or recurrent blooms (= red tides). Here, we present an analysis of the genetic diversity of and cryptophyte populations from 10 environmental samples (eight globally dispersed habitats including five blooms), using group-specific primers for partial 18S, ITS, and partial 28S rRNA genes as well as cryptophyte large subunit RuBisCO genes ().