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Nature 419, 565 (10 October 2002) | doi:10.1038/419565a

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Microbial food webs: The ocean's veil

Victor Smetacek1

Imagine being whisked in a flight of fantasy into the microbial world of the oceans' sunlit layer, and being able to see the smallest organisms on the planet running its largest ecosystem. At your new, micrometre-sized scale, water is so thick and viscous that attempting to swim through it would be futile.