Oligotrophic refers to any environment which offers little to sustain life. This term is usually used to describe bodies of water or soils with very low nutrient levels.

Greek etymology: Oligo : small, little, few; and trophe: nutrients, food.

Oligotrophic environments are of special interest for the alternative energy sources and survival strategies life could rely upon.

Examples of oligotrophic environments

An especially fascinating example of such a lake is Lake Vostok, a liquid freshwater lake which has been isolated from the world beneath 4 km of Antarctic ice for approximately 500,000 years.

An example of oligotrophic soils are those on white-sands, with soil pH lower than 5.0, on the Rio Negro basin on northern Amazonia that house very low-diversity, extremely fragile forests and savannahs drained by blackwater rivers. These owe this colour to the high concentration of tannins, humic acids and other organic compounds derived from the very slow decomposition of plant matter.

In addition, an example of an oligotropic system is the Florida Everglades

See also

• Oligotroph organism

Edaphology