The contribution of picoplankton size-fraction (<2 μm cells) to biogenic silica (bSi) stocks is likely to have not been included in previous analyses, making prior estimated budgets potentially underestimated. Based on size-fractionated bSi analysis in three size fractions (i.e., 0.2–2 µm; 2–20 µm; >20 µm), we observed picoplankton size class contributed a measurable and significant proportion of total bSi standing stocks in the Western Pacific Ocean (WPO). The depth-weighted average bSi stock in the < 2 μm size fraction averaged 65% of the total, indicating the magnitude of total bSi standing stocks was driven by the picoplankton fraction. While large diatoms had a relevant contribution to the > 20 μm bSi standing stock, this significant contribution of picoplankton size fraction to total bSi standing stocks was associated with marine picocyanobacteria. Interestingly, our estimated contributions of living Synechococcus alone to the < 2 μm bSi standing stock and total bSi standing stocks were small, only averaging 9% and 6%, respectively. Thus we suggested that these small but persistent contributions of living Synechococcus to the bSi standing stocks may be influenced by the detrital bSi or other siliceous organisms (e.g., Minidiscus comicus). Furthermore, water temperature had a potential effect on the variability of picoplankton bSi stock. Overall, these results provided some new insights into the various environmental and biological factors affecting the oceanic bSi standing stocks.

以前的分析中可能未包括微微浮游生物大小分数（<2μm细胞）对生物硅（bSi）储备的贡献，这使得先前估计的预算可能被低估了。根据对三个大小部分（即0.2–2 µm； 2–20 µm；> 20 µm）的大小分馏的bSi分析，我们观察到微微浮游生物大小类别在西太平洋海洋中占bSi总存量的可衡量且相当大的比例（WPO）。<2μm大小分数中的​​深度加权平均bSi储量平均占总数的65％，这表明总bSi常规储量的大小由微微浮游生物分数驱动。尽管大型硅藻对> 20μmbSi的常备料有相关贡献​​，微型浮游生物大小比例对总bSi常规存量的重要贡献与海洋微型蓝细菌有关。有趣的是，我们对生活的估计贡献聚球蓝细菌单独的<2μm的BSI站立库存和总站立BSI股太小，只有平均9％和6％之间。因此，我们建议，活的聚球菌对bSi立足种群的这些微小但持续的贡献可能受到碎屑bSi或其他硅质生物（例如Minidiscus comicus）的影响。此外，水温对浮游生物bSi储量的变异性有潜在影响。总体而言，这些结果为影响海洋bSi常规种群的各种环境和生物因素提供了一些新见解。