Noctiluca scintillans – the Sea Sparkle That Threatens the Arabian Sea 21/01/2021
Naresh M. Gohil out on his fishing boat. Photo: Malavika Vyawahare/Mongabay
On February 26, 2003, a group of scientists set out to sea from Goa in the Arabian Sea, India, on a routine mission. They called it “sea truthing,” verifying data gathered by satellites eyeing the earth from hundreds of kilometers above. What the team encountered there, in the middle of the Arabian Sea, was far from routine. About 970 kilometers northwest of Mumbai on India’s western coast, they found themselves sailing on a green swirl that spread out as far as the eye could see. At night, the waters glowed neon blue.
A single-celled organism that acts both as a plant and an animal has come to dominate wintertime algal blooms in the northern Arabian Sea. Winter blooms of Noctiluca scintillans, also known as the sea sparkle, have displaced microscopic algae called diatoms that form the basis of the marine food chain, a paper in Nature says.
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