Planktons as a Sustainable Biomonitoring Tool of Aquatic Ecosystem

The aquatic ecology is essential for human survival. Plankton may be prokaryotic or eukaryotic and unicellular, filamentous, or colonial. Plankton absorbs CO2, which then produces O2. Plankton is ecologically important in many water bodies because it forms the basis of various food chains. Phytoplankton has been employed as a feedstock for several commercial purposes. Phytoplankton has also been used in nutritional supplements, pharmacological substances, digestive enzymes, biomass, polymers, coloring agents, and contaminants. It is not typical for aquatic life, such as fish, prawns, mollusks, and reefs, to consume zooplankton as a source of fresh food. Due to its advantageous nutritive values, accessibility, flotation, ease of consumption, and appealing motility for post-larvae, plankton carries significant financial worth. In the pollution concern, planktonic organisms, which are at the bottom of the aquatic ecosystem, are reeling from difficult ecological sustainable problems facing aquatic ecosystems today, which have grown into the most demanding environmental concerns overall. We focused recent research on the effects of environmental variables on plankton ecosystems, including temperature, sunlight exposure, sunlight penetration, water, pH, wind speed and direction, transparency, seasonality, enriched nutrients, and pre-predator relationships. The contribution of aquatic ecosystems in biotechnological applications has only just been identified, but it has already proven to be helpful in the creation of alternative and healthy foods, natural medicines, and cosmetics. An indicator for the assessment of the effects that various influences have on the phytoplankton ecology is available. These aspects contribute to the development of an appropriate management strategy for aquatic ecosystems. The plankton ecology offers a foundation on which to base the surveillance and assessment of aquatic ecosystem management practices. In this book chapter, we discussed plankton and its role in aquatic ecosystems as a sustainable tool.