The Pacific Ocean is also the deepest ocean out of all four oceans. The Atlantic
contains the second largest body of water. Next is the Indian Ocean, which is
on the borderline of being a big ocean and a small ocean. Last is the Arctic
Ocean, which by all means is the smallest ocean of them all.
Ocean water and currents affect the climate. Because it takes far more
energy to change the temperature of water than land or air, water warms up
and cools off much more slowly than either. As a result, inland climates are
subject to more extreme temperature ranges than coastal climates, which are
insulated by nearby water. Over half the heat that reaches the earth from the
sun is absorbed by the ocean's surface layer, so surface currents move lots of
heat. Currents that originate near the equator are warm; currents that flow
from the poles are cold.
The reason the ocean water is salty is because the water flows in rivers,
it picks up small amounts of mineral salts from the rocks and soil of the river
beds. This very slightly salty water flows into the oceans and seas. The water
in the oceans only leaves by evaporating , but the salt remains dissolved in the
ocean. It does not evaporate. So the remaining water gets saltier and saltier as
time passes.
Some of the animals include: the Angelfish, the angel shark, the basking
shark, the bull shark, the bowhead whale, the great white shark, the great
hammerhead shark, the thresher shark, and the sting ray to name just a few.
The oceans contain 99% of the living species on the planet. When a shark
attacks you, its most likely to be a great white shark. The great white sharks
rely on their sense of smell for food and also meat, so that’s why they attack
humans, even though they don’t like the taste of us.
Plant life in the ocean is very important to the survival of all parties
involved. Plants are the basis of the food chain for almost all animals, mainly
excluding those found in the deeper regions of the waters where there is very
little to no sun light available to plants. There are bacteria that can live as
deep as 1500m to 3200m near deep sea hot vents. These bacteria use a
compound called hydrogen sulfide, instead of sunlight, to make their food.
The bacteria get the hydrogen sulfide from deep sea hot water geysers that
release this compound.
In fact, because of these tiny bacteria an entire community of animals
can survive and thrive in these hot vent areas. There are many plants that live
and thrive in the ocean. They include seaweed, rockweed, sargassum, and
seagrass. Plants in the sea serve as places of shelter for tiny fish. Their long
weed-like tentacles make perfect hiding places when trying to escape
predators. Seaweeds are able to survive in the ocean because they go through
the process of photosynthesis and have a gelatinous coating that protects it
from taking in too much salt water, which would increase the solute-solvent
ratio and eventually plasmolyze the cell.
Works Sited
Mythbusters
seawifs.gsfc.nasa.gov
