Bridging the dynamics of scientific discoveries and climate education

Scientific literacy is “the understanding of science we would ideally expect of a non-specialist, that is, someone not on a career path that would entail the technical use of science concepts, theories, vocabulary, techniques, and the like”1. In this context, climate literacy is a type of scientific literacy that is pivotal for young people’s development as educated and proactive citizens. Climate literacy can empower the next generation to make responsible environmental decisions and motivate people to adopt sustainable behavior. A key climate regulator is the ocean, which covers more than 70% of the Earth. Oceanic ecosystems and marine life are also affected from pole to pole by climate change and human activity. However, the impact on the most abundant underwater life, microbes2, is rarely discussed in the media and environmental policy forums, if at all3. A drop of seawater contains approximately 1000 protists, 1,000,000 bacteria, and 10 million viruses, which comprise the marine microbiome4. Albeit their abundance, marine microbes are being left out of public discourse, international climate meetings3, and educational policy documents, such as the National Research Council’s (NRC) framework for K-12 Science Education and the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS)5,6. As a result, many people see microbes solely as disease-causing agents and remain ignorant about their vast taxonomic and functional diversity, ecological roles, and influence on our atmosphere and climate7,8,9,10 (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1: Marine microbes have an ecological impact on a global scale.
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The figure depicts microbes called coccolithophores (left side), which create blooms that are visible from space by satellites (right side). Those microbes photosynthesize, calcify, and produce climatic gas, which shapes marine food webs, seawater and atmosphere composition, rocks, and climate. Illustration by Glynn Gorick.

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The biological secrets of the marine microbiome are now being unfolded by leveraging the advancements in culture-free high-throughput sequencing and imaging techniques, implementation of environmental multi-omics approaches, and single-cell analysis10,11. For instance, the Tara Ocean expedition has been sampling microorganisms extensively since 2003, integrating taxonomy, gene expression, and physiological traits of the global marine microbiome11. This holistic approach unravels how microbes are affected by climate change and how we can protect them and the myriad of species they support10. Campaigns like Tara Oceans engage the community, bringing marine microbiology into schools and discussing local ecological questions with the public. The lesson taken from such initiatives is that collaboration between scientists and educators can bridge the dynamics of scientific discoveries in marine microbiology and ecology and climate education12. Updating the current science education standards6 with contemporary marine microbiome research will revolutionize how students think about microbes and strengthen their mechanistic understanding of climate change. Here, we call scientists, teachers, and educational policy makers to create partnerships aiming to promote climate literacy by taking 4 actions: Updating educational policies, creating a new pedagogical framework, developing teaching and learning materials, and establishing teacher-training programs.

Updating educational policies: regarding marine microbes as an integral part of climate literacy

Educational policies recognize the importance of connecting scales: by the end of 12th grade, students in the U.S. are expected to have a proper understanding of scale relationships, and to recognize what is relevant at different measures of size, time, and energy, and how changes in scale, proportion, or quantity affect a system’s structure or performance13. To apply this key crosscutting concept according to the NRC framework (“scale, proportion, and quantity”), we argue that marine microbial ecology should be included in school curricula as part of the disciplinary core idea for life sciences education, “Ecosystems: Interactions, Energy, and Dynamics”13 (Table 1). An additional crosscutting concept that could be addressed by learning about the marine microbiome is the mechanistic understanding of events and processes, providing opportunities to test biological response across given contexts and “to predict and explain events in new contexts”13. Applying this concept (“Cause and effect”), and others (“Systems and system models”, “Structure and function,” and “Stability and change”), from the perspective of marine microbes, is pivotal to understanding the reasons, scope, and impacts of the triple planetary crisis (climate, pollution, and biodiversity)9,14. We call to update the NGSS, which were published more than a decade ago6 (and parallel documents in different countries) by emphasizing the advancements in marine microbiology research4 (Table 1).

Table 1 Incorporation of marine microbiology into the NRC Framework for K-12 Science Education
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Creating a new pedagogical framework to integrate marine microbes into the curricula

We encourage marine microbiologists and science teaching experts to define essential concepts and knowledge components that students should know about marine microbes by the end of 12th grade. Joint thinking of the professional community is essential to reach a consensus on core ideas and scientific facts that will improve the curricula. We suggest putting the spotlight on the key environmental roles played by marine microbes, and how they are impacted by seawater warming, acidification, and pollution. A possible integration of marine microbiology into K-12 science education curricula is suggested in Table 1.

Developing teaching and learning materials to uncover the “unseen majority” of our changing oceans

Marine microbiology is a relatively young field in modern science, and therefore adequate teaching and learning resources are not widely available9,12. We call on scientists and educators to collaborate and develop online multilingual marine microbiology textbooks, class activities, and experimental protocols for elementary and high school levels. Educational resources should provide foundational knowledge and practices to implement in lessons, which should be inspired by the technological and conceptual advancements that fueled recent discoveries in marine microbiology10.

Marine microbes are incredibly abundant and diverse, supporting ecosystem functions and responding to environmental change in many ways. One compelling example that can be used in the classroom is coccolithophores (Fig. 1, Table 1). Coccolithophores are photosynthetic cells (5–50 µm in diameter) that can form vast blooms, which are visible from space, and satellite images can be used to demonstrate how clusters of microbes can extend over thousands of square kilometers. They produce oxygen and capture carbon dioxide in cells that eventually die and sink to the ocean interior, a process described as a “biological carbon pump,” which draws down atmospheric carbon—an analogy that can illustrate the power of a coccolithophore bloom. Coccolithophores also calcify intricate calcium carbonate skeletons, which contribute considerably to the total marine chalk formation. Marine chalk creates important habitats, sequesters carbon, and controls seawater alkalinity. Ocean warming and acidification pose a serious threat to calcification by coccolithophores and other pelagic calcifiers, including foraminifera and pteropods. This leads to physiological damage and population decrease, with negative consequences on higher trophic levels and marine carbon sequestration15. This exemplifies how anthropogenic stress on the smallest organisms can be translated into a complex environmental impact on an immense scale. Coccolithophores also produce a climate-active gas called dimethylsulfide (DMS), known as the smell of the sea. When emitted into the atmosphere, DMS promotes cloud formation, which can impact the Earth’s albedo and the climate. Decadal positive trends in oceanic DMS levels suggest that microbes such as coccolithophores may balance Earth’s radiative budget and play a surprising role in mitigating global warming16. Overall, coccolithophore biology and ecology can demonstrate to students the multi-scale nature and vulnerability of marine microbes in the era of the Anthropocene.

Establishing a teacher-training program to provide knowledge and tools to convey complex ecological concepts related to the marine microbiome

We propose a new approach to teaching climate change by connecting climatic processes with marine dynamics from the micro to the macro scale. This challenging task can be addressed by promoting children’s imagination, creativity, exploration17, experimentation18, and argumentation. We encourage scientists to empower teachers by establishing teacher-training programs to provide the knowledge and skills to teach marine microbiology in the context of climate change12. Scientists could be engaged in such programs by giving lectures, guiding lab tours12, advertising citizen-science projects19, and demonstrating classical experiments in marine microbiology that could be adapted to the high school level12,18,20,21 (Table 1).

Transforming how we teach climate change through the marine microbes’ lens will be valuable not only in explaining how we negatively impact planet Earth, but also how we can heal it. Sustainable aquaculture, renewable and alternative energy, CO2 sequestration, blue economy, and even recovery of coral reefs are all manifestations of microbiology-based solutions14,22. Bringing marine microbiome research into the classroom will advance ocean and climate literacy among the next generation and may foster an optimistic viewpoint as an effective strategy to mitigate and adapt to the climate crisis in the long term.