Differential effects of food availability on population growth and fitness of three species of estuarine, bacterial-feeding nematodes

Santos, Giovanni dos; Derycke, Sofie; Fonsêca-Genevois, Verônica; Coelho, Luana Cassandra Breitenbach Barroso; Correia, Maria T.S.; Moens, Tom

doi:10.1016/j.jembe.2007.11.015

Cited by 53 publications

(46 citation statements)

References 52 publications

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“…Many studies show that meiofauna feed on benthic microalgae, freshly sedimented phytodetritus and seagrass detritus (Lee 1980;Rudnick 1989;Riera et al 1996;Olafsson and Elmgren 1997;Buffan-Dubau and Carman 2000;Gooday 2003;Murray 2006;Torres-Pratts and Schizas 2007;Mascart et al 2013Mascart et al , 2015. Nematode responses to food availability as well as to other environmental factors can be species-specific with a complex relationship between species diversity and function (Dos Santos et al 2008). Meiofauna represent, in turn, an important food resource for macrofauna and a variety of juvenile fish (Giere 2009).…”

Section: Marine Meiofaunal Diversity and Ecosystem Functioningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Is the meiofauna a good indicator for climate change and anthropogenic impacts?

et al. 2015

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Our planet is changing, and one of the most pressing challenges facing the scientific community revolves around understanding how ecological communities respond to global changes. From coastal to deep-sea ecosystems, ecologists are exploring new areas of research to find model organisms that help predict the future of life on our planet. Among the different categories of organisms, meiofauna offer several advantages for the study of marine benthic ecosystems. This paper reviews the advances in the study of meiofauna with regard to climate change and anthropogenic impacts. Four taxonomic groups are valuable for predicting global changes: foraminifers (especially calcareous forms), nematodes, copepods and ostracods. Environmental variables are fundamental in the interpretation of meiofaunal patterns and multistressor experiments are more informative than single stressor ones, revealing complex ecological and biological interactions. Global change has a general negative effect on meiofauna, with important consequences on benthic food webs. However, some meiofaunal species can be favoured by the extreme conditions induced by global change, as they can exhibit remarkable physiological adaptations. This review highlights the need to incorporate studies on taxonomy,

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Section: Marine Meiofaunal Diversity and Ecosystem Functioningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Is the meiofauna a good indicator for climate change and anthropogenic impacts?

et al. 2015

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Section: à2mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The nematode's response to food availability and quality as well as to other environmental factors are highly species-specific (Santos et al, 2008) and the food availability and quality are important factors driving the strong heterogeneous smallscale spatial distribution observed in nematode communities (Moens et al, 1999(Moens et al, , 2002Santos et al, 2008). The density, biomass, diversity, species life history and composition patterns can vary under different conditions of food availability (Santos et al, 2008). For instance, the source of organic matter determines assemblages composition, decaying organic matter attracts some nematode species and repels others (Ó lafsson et al, 1999), and the labile organic carbon derived from microphytobenthos and selected phytoplankton constitutes an important carbon source to nematodes; however, the organic matter from terrestrial or riverine origin is a poor contribution to the benthic food webs (Moens et al, 2002).…”

Section: à2mentioning

confidence: 99%

Spatial distribution of subtidal Nematoda communities along the salinity gradient in southern European estuaries

et al. 2009

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a b s t r a c tThis study investigated the spatial distribution of subtidal nematode communities along the salinity gradients of two Portuguese estuaries exposed to different degrees of anthropogenic stress: the Mira and the Mondego.The nematode communities were mainly composed of Sabatieria, Metachromadora, Daptonema, Anoplostoma, Sphaerolaimus and Terschellingia species, closely resembling the communities of Northern European estuaries. In both estuaries, nematode density and community composition followed the salinity gradient, naturally establishing three distinct estuarine sections: (i) freshwater and oligohaline -characterised by the presence of freshwater nematodes, low nematode density and diversity; (ii) mesohaline -dominated by Terschellingia, Sabatieria and Daptonema, with low total density and diversity; and (iii) polyhaline and euhaline -where nematodes reached the highest density and diversity, and Paracomesoma, Synonchiella, and Odontophora were dominant.Despite the similarities in community composition and total nematode density, the proportion of different nematode feeding types were remarkably different in the two estuaries. In Mira, selective deposit feeders were dominant in the oligohaline section, while non-selective deposit feeders were dominant in the other sections. On the contrary, in the Mondego estuary, epigrowth-feeders and omnivores/predators were dominant in the freshwater sections and in the euhaline sector of the southern arm.Differences observed along each estuarine gradient were much stronger than overall differences between the two estuaries. In the Mondego estuary, the influence of anthropogenic stressors seemed not to be relevant in determining the nematodes' spatial distribution patterns, therefore suggesting that mesoscale variability responded essentially to natural stressors, characteristic of estuarine gradients. Nevertheless, the proportion of the different feeding types was different between the two estuaries, indicating that the response of nematode feeding guilds is able to reflect anthropogenic-induced stress and can be useful in assessing biological quality in transitional waters ecosystems.

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“…Females from Gotland Deep were slightly longer (1700 μm on average) than females from Gdansk Deep (1650 μm on average); however, this difference was not statistically significant (p40.05, Kruskal-Wallis test). Such differences in body length can occur within a population in relation to certain differences in environmental conditions, e.g., food availability (Herman and Vranken, 1988;dos Santos et al, 2008).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%