AI Research

Tiny creature gorges, gets fat, and locks up planet-warming carbon

Published

3 days ago

July 4, 2025

Georgina Rannard

Climate and science correspondent

Prof Daniel J Mayor @oceanplankton A close-up of the head of the copepod, Calanus propinquus, showing its bright red antennae and hair-like feeding appendages.

A tiny, obscure animal often sold as aquarium food has been quietly protecting our planet from global warming by undertaking an epic migration, according to new research.

These “unsung heroes” called zooplankton gorge themselves and grow fat in spring before sinking hundreds of metres into the deep ocean in Antarctica where they burn the fat.

This locks away as much planet-warming carbon as the annual emissions of roughly 55 million petrol cars, stopping it from further warming our atmosphere, according to researchers.

This is much more than scientists expected. But just as researchers uncover this service to our planet, threats to the zooplankton are growing.

Female copepods (4mm) with cigar-shaped fat stores in their bodies

Prof Daniel J Mayor @oceanplankton Female copepods (Calanus simillimus) displaying variable quantities of lipid (fat) reserves – the clear cigar shaped ‘bubble’ within their bodies. Body length approximately 4mm. — Female copepods (4mm) with cigar-shaped fat stores in their bodies

Scientists have spent years probing the animal’s annual migration in Antarctic waters, or the Southern Ocean, and what it means for climate change.

The findings are “remarkable”, says lead author Dr Guang Yang from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, adding that it forces a re-think about how much carbon the Southern Ocean stores.

“The animals are an unsung hero because they have such a cool way of life,” says co-author Dr Jennifer Freer from British Antarctic Survey.

But compared to the most popular Antarctic animals like the whale or penguin, the small but mighty zooplankton are overlooked and under-appreciated.

This copepod has hair-like arms for feeding

If anyone has heard of them, it’s probably as a type of fish food available to buy online.

But their life cycle is odd and fascinating. Take the copepod, a type of zooplankton that is a distant relative of crabs and lobsters.

Just 1-10mm in size, they spend most of their lives asleep between 500m to 2km deep in the ocean.

Sacs of fat, or lipids, form in Southern Ocean copepods’ bodies and heads after they eat phytoplankton (the green material in the bodies in this image)

Prof Daniel J Mayor @oceanplankton The Southern Ocean copepod, Calanoides acutus, with their green pigmented guts and lipid sacs clearly visible inside its transparent body. Body length approximately 4mm. — Sacs of fat, or lipids, form in Southern Ocean copepods’ bodies and heads after they eat phytoplankton (the green material in the bodies in this image)

In pictures taken under a microscope, you can see long sausages of fat inside their bodies, and fat bubbles in their heads, explains Prof Daniel Mayor who photographed them in Antarctica.

Without them, our planet’s atmosphere would be significantly warmer.

Globally the oceans have absorbed 90% of the excess heat humans have created by burning fossil fuels. Of that figure, the Southern Ocean is responsible for about 40%, and a lot of that is down to zooplankton.

Prof Daniel J Mayor @oceanplankton A close-up of Antarctic krill, Euphausia superba, showing its specialised front limbs (the ‘feeding basket’) that help them harvest microscopic phytoplankton (algae) from the water. Its green gut demonstrates their effectiveness. It has orange patches in his body and front legs, with a large black eye at the top of its body.

Millions of pounds is being spent globally to understand how exactly they store carbon.

Scientists were already aware that the zooplankton contributed to carbon storage in a daily process when the animals carbon-rich waste sinks to the deep ocean.

But what happened when the animals migrate in the Southern Ocean had not been quantified.

The latest research focussed on copepods, as well as other types of zooplankton called krill, and salps.

The creatures eat phytoplankton on the ocean surface which grow by transforming carbon dioxide into living matter through photosynthesis. This turns into fat in the zooplankton.

“Their fat is like a battery pack. When they spend the winter deep in the ocean, they just sit and slowly burn off this fat or carbon,” explains Prof Daniel Mayor at University of Exeter, who was not part of the study.

“This releases carbon dioxide. Because of the way the oceans work, if you put carbon really deep down, it takes decades or even centuries for that CO2 to come out and contribute to atmospheric warming,” he says.

Dr Jennifer Freer analysed the zooplankton on board the Sir David Attenborough polar ship

Jennifer Freer Dr Jennifer Freer stands on deck of the Sir David Attenborough polar ship wearing orange high-vis safety clothing, a red hat and sunglasses. She is holding on to the rope railing next to the ocean. Close to the ship is the tip of an iceberg visible at the water surface. The sky is blue with some clouds. — Dr Jennifer Freer analysed the zooplankton on board the Sir David Attenborough polar ship

The research team calculated that this process – called the seasonal vertical migration pump – transports 65 million tonnes of carbon annually to at least 500m below the ocean surface.

Of that, it found that copepods contribute the most, followed by krill and salps.

That is roughly equivalent to the emissions from driving 55 million diesel cars for a year, according to a greenhouse gas emissions calculator by the US EPA.

Plankton sampling often happens at midnight when the animals are closest to the ocean surface.

Prof Daniel J Mayor @oceanplankton Five scientists wearing high-vis orange jackets and dark trousers on board the Sir David Attenborough polar ship. They are working with a fishing net equipped with 9 closing nets and has a 1 × 1 m mouth. There is a large yellow crane above them. — Plankton sampling often happens at midnight when the animals are closest to the ocean surface.

The latest research looked at data stretching back to the 1920s to quantify this carbon storage, also called carbon sequestration.

But the scientific discovery is ongoing as researchers seek to understand more details about the migration cycle.

Earlier this year, Dr Freer and Prof Mayor spent two months on the Sir David Attenborough polar research ship near the South Orkney island and South Georgia.

Using large nets the scientists caught zooplankton and brought the animals onboard.

“We worked in complete darkness under red light so we didn’t disturb them,” says Dr Freer.

“Others worked in rooms kept at 3-4C. You wear a lot of protection to stay there for hours at a time looking down the microscope,” she adds.

Antarctic krill (50-60mm) with green guts showing they’ve recently eaten algae

Prof Daniel J Mayor @oceanplankton A collection of Antarctic krill, Euphausia superba. The guts of many of these specimens are green, indicating that they have recently been feeding on microscopic algae (phytoplankton). Body lengths approximately 50-60mm. — Antarctic krill (50-60mm) with green guts showing they’ve recently eaten algae

But warming waters as well as commercial harvesting of krill could threaten the future of zooplankton.

“Climate change, disturbance to ocean layers and extreme weather are all threats,” explains Prof Atkinson.

This could reduce the amount of zooplankton in Antarctica and limit the carbon stored in the deep ocean.

Krill fishing companies harvested almost half a million tonnes of krill in 2020, according to the UN.

It is permitted under international law, but has been criticised by environmental campaigners including in the recent David Attenborough Ocean documentary.

The scientists say their new findings should be incorporated into climate models that forecast how much our planet will warm.

“If this biological pump didn’t exist, atmospheric CO2 levels would be roughly twice those as they are at the moment. So the oceans are doing a pretty good job of mopping up CO2 and getting rid of it,” explains co-author Prof Angus Atkinson.

The research is published in the journal Limnology and Oceanography.

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Indonesian volcano Mount Lewotobi Laki-laki spews massive ash cloud as it erupts again

Published

16 minutes ago

July 8, 2025

Kelly Ng

Indonesia’s Mount Lewotobi Laki-laki has begun erupting again – at one point shooting an ash cloud 18km (11mi) into the sky – as residents flee their homes once more.

There have been no reports of casualties since Monday morning, when the volcano on the island of Flores began spewing ash and lava again. Authorities have placed it on the highest alert level since an earlier round of eruptions three weeks ago.

At least 24 flights to and from the neighbouring resort island of Bali were cancelled on Monday, though some flights had resumed by Tuesday morning.

The initial column of hot clouds that rose at 11:05 (03:05 GMT) Monday was the volcano’s highest since November, said geology agency chief Muhammad Wafid.

“An eruption of that size certainly carries a higher potential for danger, including its impact on aviation,” Wafid told The Associated Press.

Monday’s eruption, which was accompanied by a thunderous roar, led authorities to enlarge the exclusion zone to a 7km radius from the central vent. They also warned of potential lahar floods – a type of mud or debris flow of volcanic materials – if heavy rain occurs.

The twin-peaked volcano erupted again at 19:30 on Monday, sending ash clouds and lava up to 13km into the air. It erupted a third time at 05:53 on Tuesday at a reduced intensity.

Videos shared overnight show glowing red lava spurting from the volcano’s peaks as residents get into cars and buses to flee.

More than 4,000 people have been evacuated from the area so far, according to the local disaster management agency.

Residents who have stayed put are facing a shortage of water, food and masks, local authorities say.

“As the eruption continues, with several secondary explosions and ash clouds drifting westward and northward, the affected communities who have not been relocated… require focused emergency response efforts,” say Paulus Sony Sang Tukan, who leads the Pululera village, about 8km from Lewotobi Laki-laki.

“Water is still available, but there’s concern about its cleanliness and whether it has been contaminated, since our entire area was blanketed in thick volcanic ash during yesterday’s [eruptions],” he said.

Indonesia sits on the Pacific “Ring of Fire” where tectonic plates collide, causing frequent volcanic activity as well as earthquakes.

Lewotobi Laki-laki has erupted multiple times this year – no casualties have been reported so far.

However, an eruption last November killed at least ten people and forced thousands to flee.

Laki-Laki, which means “man” in Indonesian, is twinned with the calmer but taller 1,703m named Perempuan, the Indonesian word for “woman”.

Additional reporting by Eliazar Ballo in Kupang.

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AI Research

ASML finds even monopolists get the blues

Published

1 hour ago

July 8, 2025

The Editors

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free

Holding a virtual monopoly in a product on which the artificial intelligence boom relies should be a golden ticket. For chipmaker Nvidia, it has been. But ASML, which makes extraordinarily complex machines that etch silicon and is no less integral to the rise of AI, has found that ruling the roost can still be an up-and-down affair.

The €270bn Dutch manufacturer, which reports its earnings next week, is a sine qua non of technology; chips powering AI and even fridges are invariably etched by ASML’s kit. The flipside is its exposure to customers’ fortunes and politics.

Revenue is inherently lumpy, and a single paused purchase makes a big dent — a key difference from fellow AI monopolist Nvidia, which is at present struggling to meet demand for its top-end chips. ASML’s newest high numerical aperture (NA) systems go for €380mn; as an example of how volatile revenue can be for such big-ticket items, one delayed order would be akin to drivers holding off on buying 8,000-odd Teslas.

Initial hopes were high for robust spending on wafer fab equipment this year and next. Semi, an industry body, in December reckoned on an increase of 7 per cent this year and twice that in 2026. Jefferies, for example, now expects sales to flatline next year.

Mood music bears that out. Top chipmaker TSMC has sounded more cautious over the timing of the adoption of new high NA machines. Other big customers are reining in spending. Intel in April shaved its capital expenditure plans by $2bn to $18bn, while consensus numbers for Samsung Electronics suggest the South Korean chipmaker will underspend last year’s $39bn capex budget.

Politics is also getting thornier. Washington, seeking to hobble China’s tech prowess, has banned sales of ASML’s more advanced machines. Going further would hurt. China, which buys the less advanced but more profitable deep ultraviolet machines, typically accounts for about a quarter of sales. Last year, catch-up on orders lifted that to half.

Meanwhile, Chinese homegrown competition, given an extra nudge by US trade barriers, is evolving. Shenzhen government-backed SiCarrier, for example, claims to have encroached on ASML territory with lithography capable of producing less advanced chips.

The good news is that catch-up in this industry, with a 5,000-strong supplier base and armies of engineers, requires years if not decades. Customers, too, will probably be deferring rather than nixing purchases. The zippier machines help customers juice yields; Intel reckons it cuts processes on a given layer from 40 steps to just 10.

Over time, ASML’s enviable market position looks solid — and perhaps more so than that of Nvidia, whose customers are increasingly trying to create their own chips. Yet the kit-maker’s shares have been the rockier investment. In the past year, ASML has shrunk by a third while Nvidia has risen by a quarter; its market capitalisation is within a whisker of $4tn. That makes ASML the braver bet, but by no means a worse one.

louise.lucas@ft.com

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The enigma of Peter Thiel

Published

1 hour ago

July 8, 2025

The Editors

Peter Thiel is unlike any other Trump tech bro. As well as a wildly successful investor, he’s seen as a thinker – the philosopher king of Silicon Valley. Thiel’s acolytes in the tech world and Washington include vice-president JD Vance but his relationship with the Trump camp is complicated. And there are still questions about what, if anything, he wants with the president.

In the final episode of this season of Tech Tonic, Murad Ahmed speaks to FT columnist Gillian Tett about Thiel’s political philosophy, and to Tabby Kinder, the FT’s West Coast financial editor, about his influence in Silicon Valley.

Free to read:

How Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley funded the sudden rise of JD Vance

A time for truth and reconciliation (written by Peter Thiel)

How a little-known French literary critic became a bellwether for the US right

Palantir’s ‘revolving door’ with government spurs huge growth

This season of Tech Tonic is presented by Murad Ahmed and produced by Josh Gabert-Doyon. The senior producer is Edwin Lane and the executive producer is Flo Phillips. Sound design by Sam Giovinco. Breen Turner and Samantha Giovinco. Original music by Metaphor Music, Manuela Saragosa and Topher Forhecz are the FT’s acting co-heads of audio.

Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com

View our accessibility guide.

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