First digital map of geology of the seafloor has been created by researchers from the University of Sydney’s School of Geosciences. For the first time, the distribution of composition of the seafloor that covers 70% of the Earth’s surface has been recorded in detail in 40 years.

The map has been published in the latest edition of Geology; it will assist scientists in understanding more about how oceans are affected, and will be affected to environmental change. It has been also found that the deep ocean basins will be more complex than what was thought earlier.

According to lead researcher Adriana Dutkiewicz from the University of Sydney, it is required to better understand what is conserved in the geological record of the seabed, so as to know about environmental change in the deep-seas.

Dutkiewicz added, “The deep ocean floor is a graveyard with much of it made up of the remains of microscopic sea creatures called phytoplankton, which thrive in sunlit surface waters. The composition of these remains can help decipher how oceans have responded in the past to climate change”.

A group of phytoplankton known as diatoms leads to production of nearly a quarter of the oxygen that is inhaled by us and it plays major role in tackling global warming compared to the majority of plants.

The latest seafloor geology map is showing that diatom buildups on the seafloor are almost completely independent of diatom present in surface waters in the Southern Ocean.