Tara Oceans: towards global ocean ecosystems biology

• Published in: Nature Reviews Microbiology
• Main Authors: Sunagawa, Shinichi, Acinas, Silvia G., Bork, Peer, Bowler, Chris, Babin, Marcel, Boss, Emmanuel, Cochrane, Guy, de Vargas, Colomban, Follows, Michael, Gorsky, Gabriel, Grimsley, Nigel, Guidi, Lionel, Hingamp, Pascal, Iudicone, Daniele, Jaillon, Olivier, Kandels, Stefanie, Karp-Boss, Lee, Karsenti, Eric, Lescot, Magali, Not, Fabrice, Ogata, Hiroyuki, Pesant, Stéphane, Poulton, Nicole, Raes, Jeroen, Sardet, Christian, Sieracki, Mike, Speich, Sabrina, Stemmann, Lars, Sullivan, Matthew B, Wincker, Patrick, Eveillard, Damien, Lombard, Fabien, Pesant, Stephane
• Other Authors: Department of Biology, Institute of Microbiology and Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, ETH Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland, Department of Marine Biology and Oceanography, Institute of Marine Sciences–CSIC, Barcelona, Spain, Structural and Computational Biology, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Heidelberg, Germany, Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine, Berlin, Germany, Department of Bioinformatics, Biocenter, University of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany, Research Federation for the Study of Global Ocean Systems Ecology and Evolution, FR2022/Tara GOSEE, Paris, France, Institut de Biologie de l’ENS, Département de Biologie, École Normale Supérieure, CNRS, INSERM, Université PSL, Paris, France, Département de Biologie, Québec Océan and Takuvik Joint International Laboratory (UMI 3376), Université Laval (Canada)–CNRS (France), Université Laval, Quebec, QC, Canada, School of Marine Sciences, University of Maine, Orono, ME, USA, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, European Bioinformatics Institute, Welcome Trust Genome Campus, Hinxton, Cambridge, UK, Sorbonne Université and CNRS, UMR 7144 (AD2M), ECOMAP, Station Biologique de Roscoff, Roscoff, France, Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA, Sorbonne Université, CNRS, Laboratoire d’Océanographie de Villefranche, Villefranche-sur-Mer, France, CNRS UMR 7232, Biologie Intégrative des Organismes Marins, Banyuls-sur-Mer, France, Sorbonne Universités Paris 06, OOB UPMC, Banyuls-sur-Mer, France, Aix Marseille Universit/e, Université de Toulon, CNRS, IRD, MIO UM 110, Marseille, France, Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn, Naples, Italy, Génomique Métabolique, Genoscope, Institut de Biologie Francois Jacob, Commissariat à l’Énergie Atomique, CNRS, Université Evry, Université Paris-Saclay, Evry, France, Directors’ Research, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Heidelberg, Germany, Institute for Chemical Research, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan, PANGAEA, University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany, MARUM, Center for Marine Environmental Sciences, University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany, Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences, East Boothbay, ME, USA, Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Rega Institute, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium, Center for the Biology of Disease, VIB KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium, Department of Applied Biological Sciences, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium, Department of Geosciences, Laboratoire de Météorologie Dynamique, École Normale Supérieure, Paris, France, Ocean Physics Laboratory, University of Western Brittany, Brest, France, Department of Microbiology, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA, Department of Civil, Environmental and Geodetic Engineering, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA, Center for RNA Biology, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA, Université de Nantes, CNRS, UMR6004, LS2N, Nantes, France
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: unknown
• Published: Springer Science and Business Media LLC 2020
• Subjects: Arctic; Canada; Climate change
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10754/678974; https://doi.org/10.1038/s41579-020-0364-5

A planetary-scale understanding of the ocean ecosystem, particularly in light of climate change, is crucial. Here, we review the work of Tara Oceans, an international, multidisciplinary project to assess the complexity of ocean life across comprehensive taxonomic and spatial scales. Using a modified sailing boat, the team sampled plankton at 210 globally distributed sites at depths down to 1,000 m. We describe publicly available resources of molecular, morphological and environmental data, and discuss how an ecosystems biology approach has expanded our understanding of plankton diversity and ecology in the ocean as a planetary, interconnected ecosystem. These efforts illustrate how global-scale concepts and data can help to integrate biological complexity into models and serve as a baseline for assessing ecosystem changes and the future habitability of our planet in the Anthropocene epoch. Polar Circle expeditions) would not exist without the leadership of the Tara Ocean Foundation and the continuous support of 23 institutes (https://oceans.taraexpeditions.org/). The authors further thank the commitment of the following sponsors: the French CNRS (in particular Groupement de Recherche GDR3280 and the Research Federation for the Study of Global Ocean Systems Ecology and Evolution FR2022/Tara GOSEE), the French Facility for Global Environment (FFEM), the European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Genoscope/CEA, the French Ministry of Research and the French Government Investissements d’Avenir programmes OCEANOMICS (ANR-11-BTBR-0008), FRANCE GENOMIQUE (ANR-10-INBS-09-08) and MEMO LIFE (ANR-10-LABX-54), the PSL research university (ANR-11-IDEX-0001-02) and EMBRC-France (ANR-10-INBS-02). Funding for the collection and processing of the Tara Oceans data set was provided by the NASA Ocean Biology and Biogeochemistry Program under grants NNX11AQ14G, NNX09AU43G, NNX13AE58G and NNX15AC08G (to the University of Maine), the Canada Excellence Research Chair in Remote Sensing of Canada’s New Arctic Frontier and the Canada ...