Nicole Millette
William & Mary, VA·Ecology & Evolution
Ocean plankton are usually sorted into two groups. Phytoplankton make food by photosynthesis, like plants.
- Fields
Ecology & Evolution
Earth & Environmental Science
Biology
- Topics
mixotrophs
mixotrophy
protists
- Grants
- 2 known grants, through Feb 2027
What they work on
- Measure how much carbon eight mixotroph species get from photosynthesis versus prey ingestion under different environmental conditions, using isotopic labelling incubation experiments.
- Test whether cell size predicts the balance between photosynthesis and feeding in mixotrophic protists, giving a measured basis for the size rules used in ocean ecosystem models.
- Test whether Southern Ocean mixotrophs graze more on prey under iron and manganese colimitation, by measuring growth, grazing rates and cell element makeup in cultures isolated from Antarctic waters.
- Use transcriptomics, the profiling of active genes, to identify the metabolic pathways behind feeding behavior and trace metal stress in Antarctic mixotroph cultures.
More about the research
Zooplankton eat other organisms, like animals. A large share of plankton are actually mixotrophs, which do both. They are hard to study, so scientists know little about how much they photosynthesize compared with how much they eat, and how they shape the flow of carbon and nutrients through ocean food webs. This research examines that balance from two angles: how a mixotroph's cell size affects the way it gets carbon, and how Antarctic mixotrophs use eating to survive when trace metals are scarce.
Why it matters
Mixotrophs move carbon and nutrients through ocean food webs in ways current models capture poorly. Measuring how cell size and trace metal scarcity shape their feeding could make ocean ecosystem and carbon-cycle models more accurate. Better models could improve predictions of how plankton communities and nutrient cycling will change as ocean conditions shift, including in Antarctic waters.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Collaborative Research: Investigating the relationship between size and the balance between carbon acquisition modes in mixotrophic protists
NSF · Mar 2023 – Feb 2027
Collaborative Research: Mixotrophic Grazing as a Strategy to meet Nutritional Requirements in the Iron and Manganese Deficient Southern Ocean
NSF · Feb 2023 – Jan 2027
Closest labs
Robert Campbell
University of Rhode Island, RI·Earth & Environmental Science
Assess the sources and sinks of trace metals (iron, manganese, copper, nickel, cadmium, zinc, lead) and microplastics in the East Siberian and Laptev seas, including the role of river input and sea ice.
Carl Lamborg
University of California-Santa Cruz, CA·Earth & Environmental Science
Characterize zooplankton communities along the central and western Aleutian Islands at sites with known differences in mercury levels in marine life, combining oceanography and genomics.
Gregory Cutter
Old Dominion University, VA·Earth & Environmental Science
Quantify the total inventory of dissolved organic sulfur (DOS), trace carbon-bound sulfur compounds, across the Pacific Ocean using archived samples from over 100 sites between Alaska and Antarctica.
The school
William & Mary: 11 labs on PI Pages, $95M a year on research, 67 research doctorates a year.
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