In this activity, you will use an inexpensive spectrophotometer* to test how light at different visible wavelengths (blue, green, red) is transmitted, or absorbed, through four different colored water samples.

This lesson is taken from NASA's Phytopia: Discovery of the Marine Ecosystem written in partnership with Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Science with funding from the National Science Foundation.

Students review the NASA video showing biosphere data over the North Atlantic Ocean as a time series animation displaying a decade of phytoplankton blooms and answer questions.

My NASA Data has recently released several new resources, StoryMaps, for use in educational settings.

This resource helps to identify and access GLOBE protocols and hands-on learning activities that complement the Phytoplankton Distribution phenomenon.

Explore and connect to the GLOBE Oceans protocol bundle.