To mark a decade of significant progress in the increasingly important discipline of marine microbiology, the October issue of Nature Reviews Microbiology features a special focus on the topic.The issue contains a collection of articles that highlight the latest advances in marine microbiology and how they are leading to a new understanding of biodiversity, ecology and biogeochemistry. The topics covered range from recent advances in our understanding of marine ecology and metagenomics to the remote sensing of microorganisms and ecological modelling. This issue also features the marine viruses that are believed to shape microbial ocean communities, and addresses the question of microbial abundance in the extremely harsh conditions of the deep ocean biosphere.

From 13 September 2007, these articles are available free to download owing to the generous support of the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and the Agouron Institute. This special issue is also accompanied by a Web Focus that draws together relevant articles published in journals across the Nature Publishing Group.