© File copyright Colin Purrington. You may use for making your poster, of course, but please do not plagiarize, adapt, or put on your own site. Also, do not upload this file, even if modified, to third-party file-sharing sites such as doctoc.com. If you have insatiable need to post a template onto your own site, search the internet for a different template to steal. File downloaded from terdesign. Research Question Does plankton abundance increase with increasing water temperatures? Technology, Materials, and Methods We gathered data using the Plankton Portal project on the zooniverse.org website. In this project, the researchers deployed underwater cameras off the coast of California and in the Mediterranean sea and took pictures of its surroundings, including whatever plankton was in the field of view. We collected data from the California picture set. We classified each plankton identified based on the five general classifications given by the zooniverse.org website; round with no head, head with tail, jellyfish-like, ribbon/elongated, and bug-like. The website provides additional classification categories, but we decided to ignore those further classifications for this project. With each picture, we recorded the number of total plankton individuals identified as well as the number in each category mentioned above. We also recorded the depth at which the picture was captured as well as the ambient water temperature. We then entered this data into an excel spreadsheet for further analysis. Acknowledgments Thanks to Rachael Esh for aiding in the data collection process. Findings As you can see in Figure 1, the average number of plankton per picture is relatively constant until you reach the C range. There the average number increased to almost 5 individuals per picture. Figure 2 shows the different classifications of plankton and the average number of individuals identified per picture. Clearly we see that the most common type is the ribbon/elongated across two of the three temperature ranges. It clearly is the most identified class in the warmest range with over 2 individuals identified per picture. We also see that the abundance of the head with tail decreases with respect to temperature suggesting that those particular species prefer a colder environment. Conclusions and Implications Based on this data, over all we can accept the original hypothesis of plankton increasing in abundance with the increase in water temperature. It should be noted that this trend does not hold across all of the plankton studied here. As mentioned in the findings section, we observed a decrease in abundance of head and tail plankton in regards to increasing water temperature. Some of the other classifications, such as the bug-like plankton, showed seemingly no correlation between the abundancy observed and water temperature. The implications of this research are far reaching. Plankton make up an important piece of the oceanic food web, many marine species rely on high abundance of plankton to survive. They also provide a role in the carbon cycle by fixing atmospheric carbon into their complex and delicate body structures. If climate change alters the water temperature of the oceans, it could mean a loss of diversity for plankton and cause a bottom up trophic cascade which would have consequences on the global scale. By: Kyle Mogensen Date: Scientific Research Poster Presentation Data analysis and Literature Cited After collecting the data, we organized it in terms of the ambient water temperature. We then grouped the pictures based on the range of temperatures the fell under. For this project we used 5-10, 10-15, and C. Then we took the average of the number of individual plankton identified per each temperature range as well as the average number of plankton identified in each taxonomic category. HS-LS2 Ecosystems: Interactions, Energy, and Dynamics| Next Generation Science Standards. Retrieved October 28, 2015, from "Plankton Portal." Plankton Portal. Zooniverse.org, n.d. Web. 28 Oct Sheldon J. Plankton/gallery. (n.d.). Retrieved October 29, Do Plankton Like it Hot? NGSS Standards (HS-LS2 Ecosystems, Energy and Dynamics) Using Mathematics and Computational Thinking -Mathematical and computational thinking in 9-12 builds on K-8 experiences and progresses to using algebraic thinking and analysis, a range of linear and nonlinear functions including trigonometric functions, exponentials and logarithms, and computational tools for statistical analysis to analyze, represent, and model data. Simple computational simulations are created and used based on mathematical models of basic assumptions. Engaging in Argument from Evidence -Engaging in argument from evidence in 9–12 builds on K–8 experiences and progresses to using appropriate and sufficient evidence and scientific reasoning to defend and critique claims and explanations about the natural and designed world(s). Arguments may also come from current scientific or historical episodes in science. Cause and Effect-Empirical evidence is required to differentiate between cause and correlation and make claims about specific causes and effects