Cyanobacteria?

Question

Ok this is more of a fun question first to get it will get the 10pts, best answer, and a big pat on the back from "the craig"! here it goes.
If the prefix cyan/o means dark blue, and erythr/o means red. Cyanobacteria in marine tanks is commonly called red slime algae than why is it not called erythrobacteria?

Peter your not wrong but there is more to it that i was thinking..... Hmmm comeone copper i know your fingers are on the keyboard just itching to chime in on this!

Peter your not wrong but there is more to it that i was thinking..... Hmmm come on copper i know your fingers are on the keyboard just itching to chime in on this!

007 yeah but that is only in respect to pure color forms as far as what light is to absorbed, reflected, and refracted. In the one case you stated where cyan pigments absorb red light than red would not be reflected back as a visible color to the eye. So being that color isnt held within an object and it is related to what color of light is present to the object than perceived color can change if different regions of the spectrum are projected. Lets only look at the over all spectrum and assume that the entire range of the visible light spectrum is available to the object.

Answer 1

:D Cyanobacteria is not an algae, and is not fully photosynthetic. Because it is a bacteria, it can also rely solely on nutrients in the water to survive. Because low lighting offers little chance of photosynthesis as a primary food source, cyanobacteria is often seen in a red form (caused by low lighting) where it just consumes excess nutrients in the water... without active chlorophyll, the green color dies away, showing the bacteria's primary color, red.

Soop Nazi

Answer 2

Well, I don't keep saltwater and I ain't no Rhodes scholar or biology genius, and I know my citation is only Wikipedia, but according to them, cyanobacteria is referred to as "blue-green algae," which, then, would fit the greek root word definition issue. While I know it is said that Wikipedia should sometimes be considered with care, it has been most always correct as far as my experience, so could this be a form of the game "Gossip" where the name gets bastardized as it gets passed down the road and doesn't mean anymore what it's supposed to mean?

EDIT: Ah ha! Here is more info: "Not all blue-green bacteria are blue; some common forms are red or pink from the pigment phycoerythrin."

Did I cheat by doing research on it instead of just knowing it in my pea-brain?

Answer 3

Cyan (from Greek κυανός, meaning "blue") may be used as the name of any of a number of a range of colors in the blue/green part of the spectrum. In reference to the visible spectrum cyan is used to refer to the color obtained by mixing equal amounts of green and blue light or the removal of red from white light. As such, cyan is the complement of red in RGB and CMYK color systems: cyan pigments absorb red light. In RYB color space cyan is the compliment of red-orange.

Answer 4

blue green algae that are photosynthetic prokaryotic organisms.found almost everywhere, from fresh water to oceans and lakes, that include unicelluar and colonial species. They play a big part in the nitrogen cycle and are serve as primary producers in oceans.

Answer 5

There might be different varieties of the same bacteria, which would mean it doesn't make a difference if it's called "cyano" or "erythro".
Another reason could be that "cyano" was a word created before "erythro".
Just guessing.

Answer 6

good point, I think its because taxonomy has never been an exacting science. It probably would be a better name for it however.