Physico-chemical description of the phycosphere is still missing

Develop a clear physico-chemical description of the phycosphere that links phytoplankton exudation to the resulting spatiotemporal concentration fields of chemoattractants around individual cells in seawater.

Background

The work uses idealized steady-state diffusion (and screened diffusion) around spherical cells to capture essential features of phytoplankton-generated gradients. However, the authors note that a comprehensive, empirically grounded description of the phycosphere’s physico-chemical structure is still lacking.

Such a description would support more accurate modeling of chemotactic performance and ecological interactions at the microscale.

References

A clear physico-chemical description of the phycosphere is still missing, but some empirical models have been developed to provide a simple qualitative picture.

— Slower swimming promotes chemotactic encounters between bacteria and small phytoplankton (2410.03641 - Foffi et al., 4 Oct 2024) in Supplementary Material, Concentration fields generated by phytoplankton cells (first paragraph)