News archive

UPDATE 2025-01-31: bvolcolumns_.xlsx has been updated to correctly handle the new bvol columns in the EG-Phyto Biovolume list. Please use the current version to correctly export biovolume data. Plankton Toolbox is now accessible in version 1.4.2, designed for Windows and MacOS with Apple Silicon processors. This latest release incorporates bug…

A mistake in the 2024 NOMP biovolume file has been identified and the corrected version is now availale for download under Tools.

The latest NOMP biovolume file is now availale for download under Tools, and the data has been integrated into the taxon sheets.

A new citizen science image gallery was added, please visit please visit the Citizen science gallery.

The Nordic Microalgae website has been updated to version 2.0! The update includes a new web-interface and a major update of the taxonomic backbone, now following current accepted names in World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS), and supplementary facts has been updated to follow the most current information available. Taxonomic…

A beta version of the updated Nordic Microalgae website is now accessible! The final version is scheduled for release on April 11, 2024. The update includes a new web-interface and a major update of the taxonomic backbone, now following current accepted names in World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS), and…

An issue was identified in the method step: 400x Fields of Views within the Abundance method, where counting multiple fields of views was not functioning as intended. This issue has been successfully addressed in the latest software package, dated 2024-01-19 for Windows, and 2024-01-25 for Mac. The correction ensures accurate…

Plankton Toolbox is now accessible in version 1.4.1, designed for both Windows and MacOS, with dedicated versions for both Intel and M1 processors. This latest release incorporates an updated counting module and various minor optimizations for an improved user experience. Reports now also include AphiaID. Notably, the NOMP 2023 biovolume…

HELCOM EG PHYTO (previous name HELCOM-PEG) held an online meeting 17-18 April 2023. The main goal was to update PEG BVOL 2023 list of taxa, size classes, cell volumes and carbon content. The final version of the file is available here: https://www.ices.dk/data/Documents/ENV/PEG_BVOL.zip

The yearly meeting of the Nordic Marine Phytoplankton group (NOMP) was held in Hafnafjördur, Iceland 5-7 September 2023. Hafrannsóknastofnun, the MFRI (Marine and Freshwater Research Institute) on Iceland was hosting the meeting. There were 19 participants in house from Iceland, the Faeroes, Norway, Denmark and Sweden. The last day…

The HELCOM Expert Group of Phytoplankton (EG Phyto) informal consultation (IC) session will take place on 25th to 29th of September 2023 in Umeå, Sweden, at Umeå university.

Plankton Toolbox is available as version 1.4.0 release 31 January 2023 is available for Windows and MacOS. The new release includes fixes of minor bugs. Go to the TOOLS menu to download the software. It is free.

Plankton Toolbox is available as version 1.4.0 for Windows and MacOS. The new release includes an update of the counting module and several minor tweaks. In addition the NOMP 2022 biovolume list, which includes information from the HELCOM-PEG 2022 biovolume list and addtional taxa from the Skagerrak and the North…

Plankton Toolbox 1.3.4 for Mac and Windows was updated. A fix for a problem with the list of biomass in carbon units was implemented. The version number was not changed. Please download the software again if you downloaded it before December 8th, 2021.

Plankton toolbox 1.3.4 is available for MacOS.

Plankton toolbox 1.3.4 was released on November 22nd 2020. The software is available for Windows at http://nordicmicroalgae.org/tools. A Mac version will follow. The new version includes changes to the counting module and the functionality of reports. It includes information from the 2021 version of the HELCOM-PEG biovolume list for…

NOMP, the Nordic Marine Phytoplankton group is meeting 25-26 November 2021. Due to the covid pandemic the meeting is virtual. More than 35 persons have registered for the meeting.

Dear users of Nordic Microalgae, We have just updated our e-mail adress to nordicmicroalgae@smhi.se. The old adress will also work for a while.

Plankton toolbox 1.3.3 was released on November 26th 2020. The software is available for Mac and Windows at http://nordicmicroalgae.org/tools The new version includes changes to the counting module and the functionality of reports. It includes information from the 2020 version of the HELCOM-PEG biovolume list.

NOMP, the Nordic Marine Phytoplankton group is meeting 26-27 November 2020. Due to the covid pandemic the meeting is virtual. More than 35 persons have registered for the meeting.

Plankton Toolbox 1.3.2 for Mac OSX and Windows was released on October 10th 2019. The software is available under Nordic Microalgae Tools.

The NOMP 2019 meeting - the Nordic Marine Phytoplankton workshop is held at Flødevigen Research Station, Arendal, Norway, 16-18 Sep. 2019.

The HELCOM Phytoplankton Expert Group will meet in Daugavpils, Latvia, 8-12 April 2019. Iveta Jurgensone and Ieva Barda (Latvian Institute of Aquatic Ecology (LIAE)) are hosting the meeting this year. On the agenda this year, among other things, is a training course on diatoms, hosted by Diana Sarno (Department of…

Plankton Toolbox 1.3.1 for Mac OSX and Windows was released on September 10th 2018. The new release includes a major update of the counting module and several minor tweaks. In addition the HELCOM-PEG 2018 biovolume list is used. The list of potentially harmful taxa has been updated accorrding to the …

Plankton Toolbox 1.3.0 was released on August 29th 2018. The new release includes a major update of the counting module. In addition the HELCOM-PEG 2018 biovolume list is used. The list of potentially harmful taxa has been updated accorrding to the IOC-UNESCO Taxonomic Reference List of Harmful Micro Algae. Also…

The NOMP 2018 meeting - the Nordic Marine Phytoplankton workshop is held in Århus, Denmark, 11-12 Sep. 2018.

Nordic Microalgae is funded by the Swedish Research Council as a part of the research infrastructure Swedish Lifewatch. Swedish Lifewatch will merge with another research infrastructure named Biodiversity Atlas Sweden. Please help us to find a new name for the new merged infrastructure. You can propose the new name here: …

The HELCOM Phytoplankton Expert Group will meet in Gothenburg, Sweden, 9-13 April 2018. The Oceanographic unit of the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute is hosting the meeting this year. Check out the HELCOM-PEG gallery here.

Next year's NOMP workshop will be arranged in Aarhus, Denmark. Preliminary dates are 11-12 September 2018. NOMP is an acronym for the NOrdic Marine Phytoplankton group focussing on the North East Atlantic including the Kattegat-Skagerrak and part of the Arctic Ocean.

NOMP 2017 - the Nordic Marine Phytoplankton Workshop was helt in Reykjavik, Iceland, 5-7 September. The workshop was hosted by the Icelandic Marine and Freshwater Research Institute www.hafogvatn.is. Next year's NOMP workshop will be arranged in Aarhus, Denmark. Preliminary dates are 11-12 September 2018.

Nordic Microalgae was launched on 2 May 2011. Thus it has been active six years and one month today 2 June 2017. Here are some statistics: Images added 2109 Number of species 4486 Number of taxa 6599 Sessions 176 803 Users accessing Nordic Microalgae 100 546 Number of page views…

The software Plankton Toolbox is available for download again. The pause in avaialbility was due to moving all of Nordic Microalgae to a new server.

The download link for the software Plankton Toolbox is temporarily unavailable.

Nordic Microalgae is being updated Nordic Microalgae will be updated shortly. Updates include moving to a new server and updating server software etc. During this time new images should not be uploaded. After the update users adding content will need to renew their passwords. When the update is complete this…

The HELCOM Pytoplankton Expert Group will meet 3-7 April 2017 in St. Peterburg, Russia. More information about HELCOM-PEG is available here.

Plankton Toolbox has been updated. Changes include: The Plankton counter module has been modified after user feedback. A function to make a backup of your data is included in the Plankton counter module. A minimalistic example data set is included. Plankton groups have been changed to include only four main…

A new version of the free software Plankton Toolbox is available for Mac and Windows. Downlaod Plankton Toolbox from the Tools menu.

NOMP, the NOrdic Marine Phytoplankton group will meet in Gothenburg, Sweden 15-17 November 2016.

The Nikon small world 2016 photomicrography competition has finished. An image of a fossil diatom by Frank Fox was rated as an image of distinction. Check it out at: http://www.nikonsmallworld.com/galleries/entry/2016-photomicrography-competition/47

Birger Skjelbred, Norway, has contributed 361 images (status 8 April 2016) to Nordic Microalgae. He is the new top contributor. Check out his gallery at: http://nordicmicroalgae.org/taxon_media/photographer/Birger%20Skjelbred

The HELCOM Phytoplankton Expert Group will meet 25-29 April 2016 in Warnemünde at the Leibniz Institute of Baltic Sea Research (IOW)). More information about HELCOM-PEG is found at: http://helcom.fi/helcom-at-work/projects/phytoplankton/

Version 1.1.1 of Plankton Toolbox was released on 3 December 2015. A module for using the software when counting plankton in the microscope was added as well as several other enhancements. Download the software for Mac or Windows and the user's guide at http://nordicmicroalgae.org/tools.

The Lifewatch Plankton Data Workshop will be arranged at SMHI in Gothenburg 8-9 December 2015. More information is available in the announcement.

NOMP – Nordic Marine Phytoplankton group workshop 14-16 September 2015 in Arendal, Norway. A Nordic Marine phytoplankton workshop was arranged in August 2013 in Sweden. Norway, Denmark and Sweden participated, and the group NOMP was established. The second NOMP workshop will be hosted at Institute of Marine research, Flødevigen. NOMP…

The Nordic Microalgae Committee will meet in Drøbak, Norway, 17-19 March 2015.

The HELCOM Phytoplankton Expert Group will meet in Pärnu, Estonia, 13-17 April 2015.

Plankton Toolbox version 1.0.1 for Windows is available. Select the Tools menu.

Plankton Toolbox 1.0.0 is available for MacOS and Windows. The Plankton Toolbox is a free tool for aquatic scientists, and others, working with environmental monitoring related to phyto- and zooplankton. Go to Tools for more information and to download the application.

The HELCOM Phytoplankton Expert Group (PEG) http://helcom.fi/helcom-at-work/projects/phytoplankton This year the PEG meeting will be arranged by the Marine Research Centre, Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE). The meeting will take place on the 12-16 May 2014 at SYKE Marine Research Centre in Helsinki, Finland. http://www.syke.fi/en-US Special attention will be paid on the…

The start page of Nordic Microalgae and aquatic protozoa is now available in twelve languages.

The Swedish Microalgae Committee and invited guests from Norway and Denmark will meet in Lund 13-14 March.

The start page is now available in all the Nordic lanugages and in English. Additional language support is planned.

The Galleries function is now also available for smart phones and tablets. Check out it out at http://m.nordicmicroalgae.org. The photograpers personal galleries are found at the bottom of the list.

An image of Chaetoceros debilis by Wim van Egmond won the 2013 Nikon small world photomicrography competion. Link

Phytoplankton specialists from the Marine Research Institute, Iceland, has joined the Scandinavian Marine Phytoplankton Group - ScaMPy. After voting the new name NOMP - Nordic Marine Phytoplankton Group was chosen.

The biovolume information was updated with information from the 2013 version of the HELCOM-PEG list: Direct link: http://www.ices.dk/marine-data/vocabularies/Documents/PEG_BVOL.zip

A Scandinavian Marine Phytoplankton Workshop was arranged 26-28 August 2013. Participants from Sweden, Norway and Denmark discussed the biodiversity of marine phytoplankton, possibilities for joint monitoring and data sharing. Improving collaboration related to warnings about harmful algal blooms was another agenda item. The web site www.nordicmicroalgae.orgis used by the…

Nordic Microalgae is now available for smartphones and other handheld devices. Visit the mobile version. m.nordicmicroalgae.org adapted for smaller screens. At present it has been tested on iPhone, iPad and Android phones.

The HELCOM-PEG workshop and training course was held in Gdynia, Poland, 8-12 April 2013.

A meeting with microalgae experts from the nordic countries discussed among other things: News in Dyntaxa, www.dyntaxa.se Information about progress in the nordic countries and microalgae commitee in Norway (NoMik) and Denmark. Information about IOC-UNESCO Taxonomic Reference List of Harmful Micro Alga.e Changes in the systematics in Algaebase News in…

2013 is the next NORBAF diatom intercalibration – all interested experts are welcome! Samples to be send out ~May 2013. Deadline of counting ~end of September 2013. Workshop: period of okt-dec 2013 Auditors: Bart van de Vijver and Amelie Jarlman Welcome with any question/preregistration to maria . kahlert AT slu…

Do you have pictures on species that you need help to identify? Now you may easily upload a Forum image when you add new topic. Go to Forum and click on add new topic, scroll down to Forum image and add your image. Very easy!

Nordic Microalgae this week celebrates one year on the web after the launch on 30 June 2011. Usage of the web site is steadily increasing. We now have 1500-2000 visitors per month. Returning visitors are 46% of total since the launch. Visitors are from 129 countries. The numbers of contributors…

Forum The Forum has been enhanced. We encourage you to use this forum in order to help each other with unidentified microalgae. Link pictures or videos to your questions. Add new Forum topics if you need or contact info@nordicmicroalgae.org or malin.mohlin@smhi.comif you need any help with this. Use RSS…

The Finnish Phytoplankton Society met 13-14 November 2011. http://www.kasviplanktonseura.fi/

The Scandinavian Culture Collection of Algae and Protozoa at the University of Copenhagen has contributed images and direct links to information about cultured organisms. Scandinavian Culture Collection of Algae and Protozoa http://www.sccap.dk/

The Swedish Microalgae Committee was formed on 18 October 2011. One of its tasks will be to help govern Nordic Microalgae.

Checklists can now be downloaded.

The possibility to view images in the size of the original was added.

Galleries for diatom resting stages, dinoflagellate cysts and other resting stages were added.

Quickview replaces alphabetical view, filters in Quickview, the three latest images are shown on start page, galleries are functional, latest images are functional, hall of fame is functional, additional information for images added, templates for image information when uploading, forum and more

www.nordicmicroalgae.org is now on line, 30 June 2011.

Galleries were added. This feature will be used to show groups of images, e.g. from a certain area.

The first beta version of NordicMicroalgae.org is on line.