Artificial seawater (

abbreviated An abbreviation (from Latin ''brevis'', meaning ''short'') is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method. It may consist of a group of letters or words taken from the full version of the word or phrase; for example, the word ''abbrevia ...

ASW) is a mixture of dissolved

mineral salts In geology and mineralogy, a mineral or mineral species is, broadly speaking, a solid chemical compound with a fairly well-defined chemical composition A chemical composition specifies the identity, arrangement, and ratio of the elements ma ...

(and sometimes

vitamin A vitamin is an organic molecule (or a set of molecules closely related chemically, i.e. vitamers) that is an essential micronutrient that an organism needs in small quantities for the proper functioning of its metabolism. Essential nut ...

s) that simulates

seawater Seawater, or salt water, is water from a sea or ocean. On average, seawater in the world's oceans has a salinity of about 3.5% (35 g/L, 35 ppt, 600 mM). This means that every kilogram (roughly one liter by volume) of seawater has appr ...

. Artificial seawater is primarily used in

marine biology Marine biology is the scientific study of the biology of marine life, organisms in the sea. Given that in biology many phyla, families and genera have some species that live in the sea and others that live on land, marine biology classifie ...

and in marine and reef aquaria, and allows the easy preparation of

media Media may refer to: Communication * Media (communication), tools used to deliver information or data ** Advertising media, various media, content, buying and placement for advertising ** Broadcast media, communications delivered over mass el ...

appropriate for marine

organism In biology, an organism () is any life, living system that functions as an individual entity. All organisms are composed of cells (cell theory). Organisms are classified by taxonomy (biology), taxonomy into groups such as Multicellular o ...

s (including

algae Algae ( , ; : alga ) are any of a large and diverse group of photosynthetic, eukaryotic organisms. The name is an informal term for a polyphyletic grouping that includes species from multiple distinct clades. Included organisms range from ...

bacteria Bacteria (; singular: bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one biological cell. They constitute a large domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometres in length, bacteria were am ...

plant Plants are predominantly Photosynthesis, photosynthetic eukaryotes of the Kingdom (biology), kingdom Plantae. Historically, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi; however, all curr ...

s and

animal Animals are multicellular, eukaryotic organisms in the Kingdom (biology), biological kingdom Animalia. With few exceptions, animals Heterotroph, consume organic material, Cellular respiration#Aerobic respiration, breathe oxygen, are Motilit ...

s). From a scientific perspective, artificial seawater has the advantage of

reproducibility Reproducibility, also known as replicability and repeatability, is a major principle underpinning the scientific method. For the findings of a study to be reproducible means that results obtained by an experiment or an observational study or in a ...

over natural seawater since it is a standardized formula. Artificial seawater is also known as synthetic seawater and substitute ocean water.

Example

The tables below present an example of an artificial seawater (35.00 ‰ of salinity) preparation devised by Kester, Duedall, Connors and Pytkowicz (1967). The recipe consists of two lists of mineral salts, the first of

anhydrous A substance is anhydrous if it contains no water. Many processes in chemistry can be impeded by the presence of water; therefore, it is important that water-free reagents and techniques are used. In practice, however, it is very difficult to achi ...

salts that can be weighed out, the second of hydrous salts that should be added to the artificial seawater as a solution. While all of the compounds listed in the recipe above are

inorganic In chemistry, an inorganic compound is typically a chemical compound that lacks carbon–hydrogen bonds, that is, a compound that is not an organic compound. The study of inorganic compounds is a subfield of chemistry known as ''inorganic chemis ...

, mineral salts, some artificial seawater recipes, such as Goldman and McCarthy (1978), make use of trace solutions of

s or organic compounds.

Standard

The International Standard for making artificial seawater can be found at

ASTM International ASTM International, formerly known as American Society for Testing and Materials, is an international standards organization that develops and publishes voluntary consensus technical standards for a wide range of materials, products, systems, a ...

. The current standard is named ASTM D1141-98 (The original standard was ASTM D1141-52) and describes the standard practice for the preparation of substitute

ocean water Seawater, or salt water, is water from a sea or ocean. On average, seawater in the world's oceans has a salinity of about 3.5% (35 g/L, 35 ppt, 600 mM). This means that every kilogram (roughly one liter by volume) of seawater has approx ...

. The ASTM D1141-98 standard comes in a ready-made artificial seawater form or a "Sea Salt" mix that can be prepared by engineers and hobbyists. Generally, the ready-made artificial seawater comes in 1 gallon and 5 gallon containers, whereas the "Sea Salt" mix comes in 20lb pails (makes approximately 57 gallons) and 50lb pails (makes approximately 143 gallons).

Uses and applications

There are various applications for ASTM D1141-98 synthetic seawater including

corrosion Corrosion is a natural process that converts a refined metal into a more chemically stable oxide. It is the gradual deterioration of materials (usually a metal) by chemical or electrochemical reaction with their environment. Corrosion engi ...

studies, ocean instrument calibration and chemical processing. Typically, laboratory-grade water is used when making synthetic salts

References

External links

Artificial seawater media
Goldman & McCarthy (1978)
Culture Collection of Algae and Protozoa

Calypso Publications (1979) {{DEFAULTSORT:Artificial seawater Seaweeds Aquariums Aquatic ecology Biological oceanography Chemical oceanography Liquid water Marine biology Planktology

Example

Standard

Uses and applications

See also

References

External links