Essay On Daphnia

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Daphnia magna are animals that tend to live in lentic water and tend to feed on algae and other microscopic organisms. They are important to their environment because Daphnia help keep the food chain together. Without the Daphnia the algae would start to become over grown due to the lack of natural predators which would be eating it. It would then cause certain bodies of water to start to die off due to the abundance of algae. The purpose of this study is to help better the understanding of Daphnia and the how they respond to colder temperatures which is also known as thermotaxis.

Multiple studies have been conducted before to allow a better understanding of Daphnia’s thermotactic relationship when they experience a change of their environment. A study conducted by Jeroen Gerritsen talked about how when Daphnia were exposed to a range of temperatures. When exposed to colder water the Daphnia swam toward the top of the water column …show more content…
Stich and W. Lampert (1984), the purpose of the test was to determine if Daphnia would be attracted to an area with warm water that had a lot of food or to an area of cold water with the same amount of food as that was placed in the warm water. After the study Stitch and Lampert were able to come to the conclusion that the Daphnia favored the water that was warmer and that had more food. These findings help support the idea that Daphnia exhibit a positive thermotactic reaction when exposed to warmer water. Test has also been conducted to see how Daphnia would react when exposed to a change in temperature. When exposed to fluctuating temperatures, it was found that there was a high mortality rate. (Reichwaldt et al. 2004). These findings are important because they help us have a better understanding of the effect that warm water has on Daphnia and their environment. It can also help us better understand what will happen to the environment of the Daphnia if the water temperature continue to
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