Ocean color massive sediment load. The most important light-absorbing substance in the oceans is chlorophyll, which phytoplankton use to produce carbon by photosynthesis. Chlorophyll, a green pigment, makes phytoplankton preferentially absorb the red and blue portions of the light spectrum and reflect green light. Ocean regions with high concentrations of phytoplankton have shades of blue-green depending upon the type and density of the phytoplankton population there. The basic principle behind the remote sensing of ocean color from space is that the more phytoplankton is in the water, the greener it is. There are other substances that may be found dissolved in the
Phycoerythrin Phycobiliproteins are part of huge light harvesting antennae protein complexes called phycobilisomes. In red algae they are anchored to the stromal side of thylakoid membranes of chloroplasts, whereas in cryptophytes phycobilisomes are reduced and (phycobiliprotein 545 PE545 molecules here) are densely packed inside the lumen of thylakoides. Phycoerythrin is an accessory pigment to the main chlorophyll pigments responsible for photosynthesis. The light energy is captured by phycoerythrin and is then passed on to the reaction centre chlorophyll pair, most of the time via the phycobiliproteins phycocyanin and allophycocyanin. Phycoerythrins except phycoerythrin 545 (PE545) are composed of (αβ) monomers assembled into