The ocean represents a major reservoir of sulfur on Earth. Microorganisms can use inorganic sulfur, mainly sulfate, to form organic compounds. Among them, sulphoquinovose (SQ) has been known for 50 years as the polar headgroup of the plant and algal sulpholipid (sulfoquinovosyl diacylglycerol, SQDG), which plays a major role in the biological sulfur cycle. It is also found in most photosynthetic bacteria, some nonphotosynethetic bacteria and some Archaea. The estimated annual production of 1010 t makes SQ one of the most abundant organic sulfur compounds in nature, where it is degraded to 2,3-Dihydroxypropane-1-sulfonate (DHPS) by bacteria. Though the concentration and distribution of DHPS are similar with dimethylsulphoniopropionate (DMSP), an abundant algal product which has received considerable attention in the scientific literature, DHPS has no currently recognized role in the marine microbial food web. Thus, we cultured the bacteria in situ of the Xiamen coastal ocean with 10mM DHPS, and analyzed the response of bacteria to DHPS. We found that Nautella genus, belonging to the Roseobacter clade, made quick response. Furthermore, we cultured four representative strains of Roseobacter, including Roseobacter denitrificans JL7001, Dinoroseobacter shibae DFL12, Ruegeria pomeroyi DSS-3, Nautella italica DSM26436 with extra DHPS, explaining the process of utilization and transformation of DHPS by bacteria utilizing ultrahigh performance liquid chromatography coupled with triple-quadrupole mass spectrometry (UPLC-QQQ-MS) and fluorescence spectroscopy with the fluorescent probes NBI for detecting . We found that all of these strains had the capability to utilize DHPS for growth, and most of them degraded DHPS to HSO3-, which could be released to the environment and used by other bacteria. Therefore, as a potential source of carbon and sulfur for marine bacteria, bacterial transformation of DHPS identifies a missing component of the marine carbon and sulfur cycles.