Submitted by Anonymous on Mon, 09/19/2011 - 10:20

Mr. League, We are headed to Ingram's Pond all week to do population counts on a variety of things including plankton, macroinvertebrates, nekton, and aquatic plants. Prior to going we've learned of the water, carbon and nitrogen cycles. One of our students was curious if these cycles have much of an impact on your worms? With the abiotic conditions you face, he wants to know if these cycles are impacted and if so, how? Loaded question we know, but the soil you use is what prompted the question.

One more, how tall are emperor penguins?

Mr Crandell's 8th grade Earth science Class

Michael League

Mr. Crandell's class,Wow! Great questions!
Let's take care of the easy one first: Emperor penguins can be up to 4
feet tall. They are the tallest and heaviest penguin in the world.
Now to your harder question:
Your work at Ingram Pond is a lot like Dr. Marsh and his team's work
here at McMurdo. They are very much interested in how the abiotic
(non-living factors) are affecting the animals that live here.
Specifically, they are looking at how *Capitella* can adapt to the
extremely cold temperature of Antarctic water. Dr. Marsh's work ties
into something you might have studied in 7th grade, because he is
interested in the genetic structure of *Capitella* and trying to find
what parts of the genes are most active in adapting to temperature changes.
As for the water, carbon, and nitrogen cycles, you are quite correct
that they play important roles in the ecosystem here in Antarctica. The
water cycle is really present everywhere, with water changing between
all three states. The different types of ice alone could take a
lifetime to study.
Food is scarce and the addition of nutrients to the system via the
Carbon and Nitrogen cycles drives a lot of the distribution of the
organisms that we see. We see different concentrations of certain
species at sites with more nutrients (like the one with human
disturbance). We also see a lot of organisms concentrated around
detritus (dead stuff), breaking it down. I wonder if you'll see the
same things at Ingram Pond?
Mike