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Biology. Marine biology is the scientific study of the biology of marine life, organisms that inhabit the sea. Given that in biology many phyla, families and genera have some species that live in the sea and others that live on land, marine biology classifies species based on the environment rather than on taxonomy.
Marine life, sea life, or ocean life is the plants, animals, and other organisms that live in the salt water of seas or oceans, or the brackish water of coastal estuaries. At a fundamental level, marine life affects the nature of the planet. Marine organisms, mostly microorganisms, produce oxygen and sequester carbon.
Marine mammals are mammals that rely on marine (saltwater) ecosystems for their existence. They include animals such as cetaceans (whales, dolphins and porpoises), pinnipeds (seals, sea lions and walruses), sirenians (manatees and dugongs), sea otters and polar bears. They are an informal group, unified only by their reliance on marine ...
The deep sea is broadly defined as the ocean depth where light begins to fade, at an approximate depth of 200 m (660 ft) or the point of transition from continental shelves to continental slopes. [1][2] Conditions within the deep sea are a combination of low temperatures, darkness, and high pressure. [3] The deep sea is considered the least ...
An aquatic animal is any animal, whether vertebrate or invertebrate, that lives in bodies of water for all or most of its lifetime. [1] Aquatic animals generally conduct gas exchange in water by extracting dissolved oxygen via specialised respiratory organs called gills, through the skin or across enteral mucosae, although some are evolved from ...
The term benthos, coined by Haeckel in 1891, [3] comes from the Greek noun βένθος 'depth of the sea'. [1][4] Benthos is used in freshwater biology to refer to organisms at the bottom of freshwater bodies of water, such as lakes, rivers, and streams. [5] There is also a redundant synonym, Benton. [6]
Animals are multicellular eukaryotes, [note 1] and are distinguished from plants, algae, and fungi by lacking cell walls. [1] Marine invertebrates are animals that inhabit a marine environment apart from the vertebrate members of the chordate phylum; invertebrates lack a vertebral column. Some have evolved a shell or a hard exoskeleton.
The benthic zone is the ecological region at the lowest level of a body of water such as an ocean, lake, or stream, including the sediment surface and some sub-surface layers. The name comes from the Ancient Greek word βένθος (bénthos), meaning "the depths". [1] Organisms living in this zone are called benthos and include microorganisms ...