Abstract
Microplankton is composed of organisms between 20 and 200 µm in size (greatest axial linear dimension) and is a mixture of phytoplankton and zooplankton. It is an important component of the marine pelagic ecosystem not only as primary producers but also as consumers in the microbial loop. In the present paper, the results of microplankton species abundance and their community structure during the first Turkish Antarctic Expedition (TAE-1) at late Antarctic summer were given at four coastal stations along the west Antarctic Peninsula (wAP). According to these results, a total of 37 microplankton species were observed. Diatoms were the dominant group, followed by ciliates. The highest total microplankton cell concentrations were 18370 cells l-1 and 24350 cells l-1 at P4 and P2 sampling stations, respectively. Although the most common phytoplankton and ciliate species were Odontella weissflogii and Cymatocylis affinis, respectively, diversity indexes showed that no dominance of a species could be mentioned at any station. Additionally, we observed that the southern part of the wAP is significantly different from its northernmost part in microplankton abundance/composition.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 739-747 |
| Number of pages | 9 |
| Journal | Turkish Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences |
| Volume | 20 |
| Issue number | 10 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 2020 |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© 2020, Central Fisheries Research Inst. All rights reserved.
Funding
This study was carried under the auspices of Turkish Republic Presidency, supported by the Ministry of Science Industry and Technology (Number: TAE 1), and the project was coordinated by Istanbul Technical University (ITU) Polar Research Center (PolReC). We acknowledge the use of imagery from the NASA Worldview application (https://worldview.earth data.nasa.gov/) operated by the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Earth Science Data and Information System (ESDIS) project. Antarctica is of great scientific interest not only for the valuable mineral resources and large deposits of oil and natural gas existing in its continental shelf but also because of its natural biological sources such as fishes and krill. Commercial harvesting of marine living resources in the Southern Ocean surrounding Antarctica began by hunting of seals during the late 1700s and the commercial harvesting of krill during the 1970s (Herber, ? 缃? ?ntarctica ? which is the world ?s most important natural laboratory, is a fragile and an increasingly vulnerable ecosystem of the world. Special international regulation is needed in Antarctica due to its biological, commercial and geopolitical importance. In this context, the Antarctic treaty that was firstly established in 1959 by 12 nations, was also signed by Turkey in 1995. The Treaty has 50 member nations so far (Ozturk et al., 2014). Individual scientific studies have not been conducted by Turkish scientists and Turkey has not been performed any scientific activities in Antarctica until 2016. The first joint expedition on this continent was organized with the Ukrainian Antarctic Research Center during the 2016 Antarctic summer and supported by The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) (Ozturk et al 堃? 缃堀 Moreover ? Turkey ?s first national Antarctic expedition (TAE-1) was held between February and March 2017 and was supported by the Ministry of Science and Industry. TAE-1 provided sampling opportunity of research along Antarctic Continental Shelf at various scientific areas. Although previous studies have given historical information on the planktonic structure of Antarctic waters (Azam et al., 1991; Alder & Boltovskoy, 1991; Schloss et al., 2002; Lange et al., 2007; Hewes, 2009; Garzio & Steinberg, 2013), repetition of plankton studies is an obligation for a better understanding of environment. Thus, the main purpose of the present study is to give quantitative information on composition, community structure and biogeographic distribution of microplankton along the Antarctic Peninsula during the late summer of 2017 cruises of TAE-1.
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| Goddard | |
| Ministry of Science Industry and Technology | TAE 1 |
| Ministry of Science and Industry | |
| National Aeronautics and Space Administration | |
| Istanbul Teknik Üniversitesi |
Keywords
- Antarctica
- Community Structure
- Microplankton
- Phytoplankton
- West Antarctic Peninsula