An innovative piston corer for large‐volume sediment samples

Abstract

Coring is one of several standard procedures to extract sediments and their faunas from open marine, estuarine, and limnic environments. Achieving sufficiently deep penetration, obtaining large sediment volumes in single deployments, and avoiding sediment loss upon retrieval remain problematic. We developed a piston corer with a diameter of 16 cm that enables penetration down to 1.5 m in a broad range of soft bottom types, yields sufficient material for multiple analyses, and prevents sediment loss due to a specially designed hydraulic core catcher. A novel extrusion system enables very precise slicing and preserves the original sediment stratification by keeping the liners upright. The corer has moderate purchase costs and a robust and simple design that allows for a deployment from relatively small vessels as available at most marine science institutions. It can easily be operated by two to three researchers rather than by specially trained technicians. In the northern Adriatic Sea, the corer successfully extracted more than 50 cores from a range of fine mud to coarse sand, at water depths from three to 45 m. The initial evaluation of the cores demonstrated their usefulness for fauna sequences along with heavy metal, nutrient and pollutant analyses. Their length is particularly suited for historical ecological work requiring sedimentary and faunal sequences to reconstruct benthic communities over the last millennia.

Tracing the effects of eutrophication on molluscan communities in sediment cores: outbreaks of an opportunistic species coincide with reduced bioturbation and high frequency of hypoxia in the Adriatic Sea

“…Four closely positioned cores, 150-155 cm long, were sampled at each station in 2013 with an UWITEC ® piston corer (Gallmetzer et al 2016). Changes in abundance of C. gibba were measured in two 16-cm-diameter cores at each station (M13 and M14 cores at Po 3, M20 and M21 cores at Po 4, and M28 and M29 cores at Panzano).…”

Anthropogenically induced environmental changes in the northeastern Adriatic Sea in the last 500 years (Panzano Bay, Gulf of Trieste)

“…Three sediment cores (two for sedimentological and one for foraminiferal analyses), 1.6 m long with a diameter of 9 cm, were acquired using an UWITEC piston corer with hammer action (Gallmetzer et al, 2016) from a research vessel in summer 2013. The drilling station is located in the central part of Panzano Bay (45 • 44 7.32 N; 13 • 36 1.74 E) at a water depth of 12.5 m. The uppermost 20 cm of each core was sliced into 2 cm thick intervals in order to attain highresolution data.…”

Molluscan benthic communities at Brijuni Islands (northern Adriatic Sea) shaped by Holocene sea-level rise and recent human eutrophication and pollution

“…In summer 2013, at a water depth of 44 m (coordinates: 44.8857667 N and 13.747E), four sediment cores (length 160 cm, diameter 9 cm) were extracted with the Slovenian research vessel Manta Bianca using an UWITEC piston corer with hammer action ( Gallmetzer et al, 2016 ). The core M44 selected for the molluscan community investigation was sliced directly on board into 38 subsamples (2 cm for the uppermost 20 cm and of 5 cm for the remaining 140 cm).…”