A desert in the ocean – Depauperate fouling communities on marine litter in the hyper-oligotrophic South Pacific Subtropical Gyre

Rech, Sabine; Gusmao, Joao B.; Kiessling, Tim; Hidalgo‐Ruz, Valeria; Meerhoff, Erika; Gatta‐Rosemary, Magdalena; Moore, Charles J.; Vine, Raquelle de; Thiel, Martín

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.143545

Cited by 24 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 74 publications

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“…High levels of plastic pollution impact many species of marine mammals, sharks, turtles, seabirds, and fishes, through entanglement or ingestion (Thiel et al, 2018). Moreover, floating anthropogenic debris is known to be an agent for transporting non-indigenous species (Rech et al, 2016;Rech et al, 2018;Rech et al, 2021), thus increasing the risk of biological invasions throughout the region.…”

Section: Plastic Pollutants and Marine Debrismentioning

confidence: 99%

Borderless conservation: Integrating connectivity into high seas conservation efforts for the Salas y Gómez and Nazca ridges

et al. 2022

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Connectivity is essential to consider in area-based marine conservation measures because it greatly impacts vital ecological processes (e.g., recycling nutrients, regulating temperature, sequestering carbon, and supporting the life cycle of species). However, it is generally not well studied or integrated into conservation measures, particularly in the Southeast Pacific. This region is home to the Salas y Gómez and Nazca ridges, two adjacent seamount chains that stretch between the Peruvian coast and Rapa Nui (i.e., Easter Island). The area has been recognized for its exceptional natural and cultural significance as well as one of the most important global areas to protect. However, over 73% of the ridges are in areas beyond national jurisdiction, where they are unprotected and under threat. This study provides a synthesis of what we know about connectivity in the Salas y Gómez and Nazca ridges and provides practical recommendations for integrating this knowledge into conservation and management measures for the region. While data on connectivity is still limited, it should not constrain the development of conservation measures, which should be co-designed and co-developed, leveraging the expertise of international working groups throughout the region. Due to their high rates of endemism, as well as importance as migratory corridors, enacting large-scale conservation measures would address important conservation considerations for both connectivity and endemism. Enacting such large-scale conservation measures would not only elevate the Salas y Gómez and Nazca ridges as an exemplary case study, providing lessons for other marine regions seeking to implement similar measures, but could also help raise awareness on the severity of externally originating threats like climate change and plastic pollution to global audiences.

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Section: Plastic Pollutants and Marine Debrismentioning

confidence: 99%

Borderless conservation: Integrating connectivity into high seas conservation efforts for the Salas y Gómez and Nazca ridges

et al. 2022

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“…Since about 2002, thought-leaders began to talk about designer communities [20,21] . Novel and hybrid ecosystems can arise spontaneously as is the case for communities on marine debris [22,23] or can be intentionally established [24] .…”

Section: Restoration Of Polluted Aquatic Environmentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Within days the biofouling community compoused of barnacles, sea squirts, hydroides and bryozoans [48] forms on floats, bags and oysters [49] . Within months complex communities are found on and within the cages [24,49] . This novel community (Figure 3) is dramatically different than either an intertidal or subtidal reef.…”

Section: Ecosystem In a Bagmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In Beaufort NC and around the globe in temperate and tropical harbors about 95% of biofouling organisms are invasive species, many of which arrived with boats and trade before or with the first European settlers [51][52][53] . Though found in the immediate coastal ocean [24] biofouling communities are particularly adapted to live in polluted harbors [54] . The combined oyster reef community and biofuling community in a bag provides physical and biological ecosystem services.…”

Section: Ecosystem In a Bagmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ecosystem Restoration: Enhancing Ecosystem Services with Floating Aquaculture

Rittschof

Dobretsov

2022

Jour. of fish. Sci.

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Restoration ecologists recognize the need for restoring ecosystem servicesin sustainable ways that meet societal needs. In the UK, Ireland, Australia,and some US states the goal is restoring native oyster reefs. In otherstates, failures at restoration due to poor water quality and predation havefocused restoration activities on techniques that work, restoring intertidalreefs and generating living shorelines that reduce or reverse erosion. In theUnited States, restoring water quality and reducing or reversing erosion aresocietally accepted entry points for repairing estuarine ecosystems. Thisstudy is an overview of the current status of oyster reef restoration andprovide a novel approach called “oyster reef in a bag”. Combining oysterreef restoration efforts with existing floating oyster aquaculture technologygenerates novel ecosystems that are a combination of biofouling and oysterreef communities. These novel ecosystems could be a practical beginningto improve water quality, mitigate erosion and restore higher trophic levelecosystem services.

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“…The oceans, populated by microbes, are for the most part nutrient‐depleted (Kelly et al ., 2021; Rech et al ., 2021) so they also act as a planetary‐scale repository for viable microorganisms. It is likely that climate change will lead to the large‐scale release of nutrients into aqueous environments (Feng et al ., 2020; Duerschlag et al ., 2021; Kluge et al ., 2021), lead to the emergence of new or old pathogens (Revich et al ., 2012), and in places may promote the dissolution of some ancient salt deposits in which preserved microbes (from past biospheres) are abundant (Ramos‐Barbero et al , 2021; Pedrós‐Alió, 2021).…”

Section: Implications and Perspectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Water is a preservative of microbes

Hallsworth

2021

Microbial Biotechnology

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Summary Water is the cellular milieu, drives all biochemistry within Earth’s biosphere and facilitates microbe‐mediated decay processes. Instead of reviewing these topics, the current article focuses on the activities of water as a preservative—its capacity to maintain the long‐term integrity and viability of microbial cells—and identifies the mechanisms by which this occurs. Water provides for, and maintains, cellular structures; buffers against thermodynamic extremes, at various scales; can mitigate events that are traumatic to the cell membrane, such as desiccation–rehydration, freeze–thawing and thermal shock; prevents microbial dehydration that can otherwise exacerbate oxidative damage; mitigates against biocidal factors (in some circumstances reducing ultraviolet radiation and diluting solute stressors or toxic substances); and is effective at electrostatic screening so prevents damage to the cell by the intense electrostatic fields of some ions. In addition, the water retained in desiccated cells (historically referred to as ‘bound’ water) plays key roles in biomacromolecular structures and their interactions even for fully hydrated cells. Assuming that the components of the cell membrane are chemically stable or at least repairable, and the environment is fairly constant, water molecules can apparently maintain membrane geometries over very long periods provided these configurations represent thermodynamically stable states. The spores and vegetative cells of many microbes survive longer in the presence of vapour‐phase water (at moderate‐to‐high relative humidities) than under more‐arid conditions. There are several mechanisms by which large bodies of water, when cooled during subzero weather conditions remain in a liquid state thus preventing potentially dangerous (freeze–thaw) transitions for their microbiome. Microbial life can be preserved in pure water, freshwater systems, seawater, brines, ice/permafrost, sugar‐rich aqueous milieux and vapour‐phase water according to laboratory‐based studies carried out over periods of years to decades and some natural environments that have yielded cells that are apparently thousands, or even (for hypersaline fluid inclusions of mineralized NaCl) hundreds of millions, of years old. The term preservative has often been restricted to those substances used to extend the shelf life of foods (e.g. sodium benzoate, nitrites and sulphites) or those used to conserve dead organisms, such as ethanol or formaldehyde. For living microorganisms however, the ultimate preservative may actually be water. Implications of this role are discussed with reference to the ecology of halophiles, human pathogens and other microbes; food science; biotechnology; biosignatures for life and other aspects of astrobiology; and the large‐scale release/reactivation of preserved microbes caused by global climate change.

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A desert in the ocean – Depauperate fouling communities on marine litter in the hyper-oligotrophic South Pacific Subtropical Gyre

Cited by 24 publications

References 74 publications

Borderless conservation: Integrating connectivity into high seas conservation efforts for the Salas y Gómez and Nazca ridges

Borderless conservation: Integrating connectivity into high seas conservation efforts for the Salas y Gómez and Nazca ridges

Ecosystem Restoration: Enhancing Ecosystem Services with Floating Aquaculture

Water is a preservative of microbes

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