International Census of Marine Microbes

International Census of Marine Microbes
AbbreviationICoMM
Established2004
HeadquartersThe Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole
Parent organization
Census of Marine Life
WebsiteInternational Census of Marine Microbes

The International Census of Marine Microbes is a field project of the Census of Marine Life that inventories microbial diversity by cataloging all known diversity of single-cell organisms including bacteria, Archaea, Protista, and associated viruses, exploring and discovering unknown microbial diversity, and placing that knowledge into ecological and evolutionary contexts.[1][2][3][4]

The ICoMM program, led by Mitchell Sogin, has discovered that marine microbial diversity is some 10 to 100 times more than expected, and the vast majority are previously unknown, low abundance organisms thought to play an important role in the oceans.[5]

  1. ^ Agence France-Presse (19 April 2010). "Ocean census uncovers microbe world". ABC News. Retrieved 31 August 2017.
  2. ^ Qiu, Jane (18 April 2010). "It's a microbial world". Nature. doi:10.1038/news.2010.190.
  3. ^ Kinver, Mark (18 April 2010). "Census offers glimpse of oceans' smallest lifeforms". BBC News. Retrieved 31 August 2017.
  4. ^ "International Census of Marine Microbes (ICoMM)". Census of Marine Life. Archived from the original on 17 March 2016. Retrieved 31 August 2017.
  5. ^ Marine Biological Laboratory (2 September 2006). "Ocean microbe census discovers diverse world of rare bacteria". ScienceDaily. Retrieved 31 August 2017.