[4] Despite its lack of thecal plates, a prominent feature helpful in identifying armored flagellates, A. sanguinea is relatively large and easily recognizable.

[5] A. sanguinea’s most prominent features are the lack of a nuclear envelope chamber and the apical groove's large, clockwise path when viewed from the front of the cell.

These features, along with observations and data from LSU rDNA sequencing, recently helped declare a new genus for this species (Hansen & Moestrup).

[9] Akashiwo sanguinea exhibits a diurnal vertical migration pattern, observed to move toward the sun in field experiments even before the start of the light cycle.

[10] Akashiwo sanguinea responds to certain changes in the water column by forming subsurface chlorophyll maximum layers in the marine environment.

[10] A. sangiunea's subsurface chlorophyll maximum layer has contributed to the success of larval anchovy growth on California's coastline.

Aided by this new technology, the scientists were able to declare variations in the path of the apical groove of the organism (found on the flagellar apparatus).

A red tide caused by A. sanguinea was coincident with widespread seabird mortality across fourteen different species of birds in November–December 2007 in Northeastern Monterey Bay, California.

[7] In 2009 a huge foam event blamed on Akashiwo sanguinea killed vast quantities of sea birds from the northern Oregon coast to the tip of the Olympic Peninsula in Washington state.