Variability in plankton community structure, metabolism, and vertical carbon fluxes along an upwelling filament (Cape Juby, NW Africa)

Arı́stegui, Javier; Barton, Eric D.; Tett, Paul; Montero, María F.; García-Muñoz, Mercedes; Basterretxea, Gotzon; Cussatlegras, Anne Sophie; Ojeda, Antonio A. Ramón; Armas, D. de

doi:10.1016/j.pocean.2004.07.004

Cited by 69 publications

(55 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…However, since plankton community structure and species succession during our study closely resembled those during natural bloom events in the Canary Islands region (Basterretxea and Arístegui, 2000;Arístegui et al, 2004), we are confident that our findings are broadly representative for natural marine ecosystems of the study area.…”

Section: Evaluation Of Simulated Upwelling Of Deep Watersupporting

confidence: 60%

Influence of Ocean Acidification and Deep Water Upwelling on Oligotrophic Plankton Communities in the Subtropical North Atlantic: Insights from an In situ Mesocosm Study

et al. 2017

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Oceanic uptake of anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) causes pronounced shifts in marine carbonate chemistry and a decrease in seawater pH. Increasing evidence indicates that these changes-summarized by the term ocean acidification (OA)-can significantly affect marine food webs and biogeochemical cycles. However, current scientific knowledge is largely based on laboratory experiments with single species and artificial boundary conditions, whereas studies of natural plankton communities are still relatively rare. Moreover, the few existing community-level studies were mostly conducted in rather eutrophic environments, while less attention has been paid to oligotrophic systems such as the subtropical ocean gyres. Here we report from a recent in situ mesocosm experiment off the coast of Gran Canaria in the eastern subtropical North Atlantic, where we investigated the influence of OA on the ecology and biogeochemistry of plankton communities in oligotrophic waters under close-to-natural conditions. This paper is the first in this Research Topic of Frontiers in Marine Biogeochemistry and provides (1) a detailed overview of the experimental design and important events during our mesocosm campaign, and (2) first insights into the ecological responses of plankton communities to simulated OA over the course of the 62-day experiment. One particular scientific objective of our mesocosm experiment was to investigate how OA impacts might differ between oligotrophic conditions and phases of high biological productivity, which regularly occur in response to upwelling of nutrient-rich deep water in the study region. Therefore, we specifically developed a deep water collection system that allowed us to obtain ∼85 m 3 of seawater from ∼650 m depth. Thereby, we replaced ∼20% Taucher et al.Plankton Responses to Upwelling and CO 2 of each mesocosm's volume with deep water and successfully simulated a deep water upwelling event that induced a pronounced plankton bloom. Our study revealed significant effects of OA on the entire food web, leading to a restructuring of plankton communities that emerged during the oligotrophic phase, and was further amplified during the bloom that developed in response to deep water addition. Such CO 2 -related shifts in plankton community composition could have consequences for ecosystem productivity, biomass transfer to higher trophic levels, and biogeochemical element cycling of oligotrophic ocean regions.

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Section: Evaluation Of Simulated Upwelling Of Deep Watersupporting

confidence: 60%

Influence of Ocean Acidification and Deep Water Upwelling on Oligotrophic Plankton Communities in the Subtropical North Atlantic: Insights from an In situ Mesocosm Study

et al. 2017

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“…This dominance was particularly pronounced in both high CO 2 mesocosms (M2 and M8, see Figure 1B) and we observed a significant positive effect of pCO 2 on the abundance of diatoms during phase III (p = 0.026, F = 8.71). Plankton community structure and species succession during this study closely resembled those during natural bloom events in the Canary Islands region (Basterretxea and Arístegui, 2000;Arístegui et al, 2004) and are thus representative for natural marine ecosystems of the study area.…”

Section: Temporal Dynamics In Plankton Community Compositionmentioning

confidence: 53%

Ocean Acidification-Induced Restructuring of the Plankton Food Web Can Influence the Degradation of Sinking Particles

et al. 2018

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Ocean acidification (OA) is expected to alter plankton community structure in the future ocean. This, in turn, could change the composition of sinking organic matter and the efficiency of the biological carbon pump. So far, most OA experiments involving entire plankton communities have been conducted in meso-to eutrophic environments. However, recent studies suggest that OA effects may be more pronounced during prolonged periods of nutrient limitation. In this study, we investigated how OA-induced changes in low-nutrient adapted plankton communities of the subtropical North Atlantic Ocean may affect particulate organic matter (POM) standing stocks, POM fluxes, and POM stoichiometry. More specifically, we compared the elemental composition of POM suspended in the water column to the corresponding sinking material collected in sediment traps. Three weeks into the experiment, we simulated a natural upwelling event by adding nutrient-rich deep-water to all mesocosms, which induced a diatom-dominated phytoplankton bloom. Our results show that POM was more efficiently retained in the water column in the highest CO 2 treatment levels (>800 µatm pCO 2 ) subsequent to this bloom. We further observed significantly lower C:N and C:P ratios in post-bloom sedimented POM in the highest CO 2 treatments, suggesting that degradation processes were less pronounced. This trend is most likely explained by differences in micro-and mesozooplankton abundance during the bloom and postbloom phase. Overall, this study shows that OA can indirectly alter POM fluxes and stoichiometry in subtropical environments through changes in plankton community structure.

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“…This hypothesis is also corroborated by the current knowledge of the phytoplankton community structure of this area. The phytoplankton biomass of this region is dominated by small size cells such as picoplankton and flagellates (Head et al, 2002;Arístegui et al, 2004) and calcium-carbonate producing organisms (Fischer et al, 1996;Abrantes et al, 2002). These latter authors found that the composition of the sinking matter collected in deep sediment traps in the Canary region was dominated by coccolithophorids, which were found in both fecal pellets and aggregates all year round.…”

Section: Eddy-field Influence On Organic Matter Fluxesmentioning

confidence: 96%

Regional and temporal variability of sinking organic matter in the subtropical northeast Atlantic Ocean: a biomarker diagnosis

et al. 2010

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Abstract. Sinking particles through the pelagic ocean have been traditionally considered the most important vehicle by which the biological pump sequesters carbon in the ocean interior. Nevertheless, regional scale variability in particle flux is a major outstanding issue in oceanography. Here, we have studied the regional and temporal variability of total particulate organic matter fluxes, as well as chloropigment and total hydrolyzed amino acid (THAA) compositions and fluxes in the Canary Current region, between 20-30 • N, during two contrasting periods: August 2006, characterized by warm and stratified waters, but also intense winds which enhanced eddy development south of the Canary Islands, and February 2007, characterized by colder waters, less stratification and higher productivity. We found that the eddyfield generated south of the Canary Islands enhanced by >2 times particulate organic carbon (POC) export with respect to stations (FF; far-field) outside the eddy-field influence. We also observed flux increases of one order of magnitude in chloropigment and 2 times in THAA in the eddy-field relative to FF stations. Principal Components Analysis (PCA) was performed to assess changes in particulate organic matter composition between stations. At eddy-field stations, higher chlorophyll enrichment reflected "fresher" material, while at FF stations a higher proportion of pheophytin indicated greater degradation due to microbes and microzooplankton. PCA also suggests that phytoplankton community structure, particularly the dominance of diatoms versus carbonate-rich plankton, is the major factor influencing the POC export within the eddy field. In February, POC export

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Variability in plankton community structure, metabolism, and vertical carbon fluxes along an upwelling filament (Cape Juby, NW Africa)

Cited by 69 publications

References 42 publications

Influence of Ocean Acidification and Deep Water Upwelling on Oligotrophic Plankton Communities in the Subtropical North Atlantic: Insights from an In situ Mesocosm Study

Influence of Ocean Acidification and Deep Water Upwelling on Oligotrophic Plankton Communities in the Subtropical North Atlantic: Insights from an In situ Mesocosm Study

Ocean Acidification-Induced Restructuring of the Plankton Food Web Can Influence the Degradation of Sinking Particles

Regional and temporal variability of sinking organic matter in the subtropical northeast Atlantic Ocean: a biomarker diagnosis

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