Importance of Dissolved Oxygen | Eutrophication

Dissolved oxygen is just what it sounds like. It's oxygen that's dissolved in water. Oxygen molecules mix evenly with water molecules to form a solution. Dissolved oxygen enters water from the atmosphere, and from photosynthesis, and then gets taken up by living things, or exits into the atmosphere depending on water temperature, saltiness, and the amount of already dissolved oxygen. Animals also adapt to the amount of dissolved oxygen. Fish like salmon need a lot of oxygen so they can only live in colder places, but fish like catfish can live in warmer waters because they need less oxygen. Eutrophication is a big word that just means adding a lot of nutrients good for growing, like nitrogen and phosphorus, to a lake or a river, usually by pollution. That causes a lot of plants and cyanobacteria to bloom. When they die, they sink to the bottom of the lake and decay there, and this decay uses up all the oxygen in the lake.

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