The ChEss project of the Census of Marine Life (2002-2010) helped foster internationally-coordinated studies worldwide focusing on exploration for, and characterization of new deep-sea chemosynthetic ecosystem sites. This work has advanced our understanding of the nature and factors controlling the biogeography and biodiversity of these ecosystems in four geographic locations: the Atlantic Equatorial Belt (AEB), the New Zealand region, the Arctic and Antarctic and the SE Pacific off Chile. In the AEB, major discoveries include hydrothermal seeps on the Costa Rica margin, deepest vents found on the Mid-Cayman Rise and the hottest vents found on the Southern Mid-Atlantic Ridge. It was also shown that the major fracture zones on the MAR do not create barriers for the dispersal but may act as trans-Atlantic conduits for larvae. In New Zealand, investigations of a newly found large cold-seep area suggest that this region may be a new biogeographic province. In the Arctic, the newly discovered sites on the Mohns Ridge (71 °N) showed extensive mats of sulfur-oxidisng bacteria, but only one gastropod potentially bears chemosynthetic symbionts, while cold seeps on the Haakon Mossby Mud Volcano (72 °N) are dominated by siboglinid worms. In the Antarctic region, the first hydrothermal vents south of the Polar Front were located and biological results indicate that they may represent a new biogeographic province. The recent exploration of the South Pacific region has provided evidence for a sediment hosted hydrothermal source near a methane-rich cold-seep area. Based on our 8 years of investigations of deep-water chemosynthetic ecosystems worldwide, we suggest highest priorities for future research: (i) continued exploration of the deep-ocean ridge-crest; (ii) increased focus on anthropogenic impacts; (iii) concerted effort to coordinate a major investigation of the deep South Pacific Ocean - the largest contiguous habitat for life within Earth's biosphere, but also the world's least investigated deep-ocean basin.
Download full-text PDF |
Source |
---|---|
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3150416 | PMC |
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0023259 | PLOS |
Heliyon
March 2024
University of New South Wales, School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, Kensington, NSW, Australia.
Deep sea benthic habitats are low productivity ecosystems that host an abundance of organisms within the Cnidaria phylum. The technical limitations and the high cost of deep sea surveys have made exploring deep sea environments and the biology of the organisms that inhabit them challenging. In spite of the widespread recognition of Cnidaria's environmental importance in these ecosystems, the microbial assemblage and its role in coral functioning have only been studied for a few deep water corals.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFISME J
March 2023
University of Vienna, Centre for Microbiology and Environmental Systems Science, Department for Microbiology and Ecosystem Science, Division of Microbial Ecology, Djerassiplatz 1, 1030, Vienna, Austria.
Chemosynthetic symbioses between bacteria and invertebrates occur worldwide from coastal sediments to the deep sea. Most host groups are restricted to either shallow or deep waters. In contrast, Lucinidae, the most species-rich family of chemosymbiotic invertebrates, has both shallow- and deep-sea representatives.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFZootaxa
December 2018
Queen's University Belfast, Marine Laboratory, 12-13 The Strand, Portaferry, N Ireland..
Recent expeditions exploring deep-sea hydrothermal vent ecosystems in the Okinawa Trough, East China Sea resulted in the collection of a hitherto undescribed species of polyplacophoran mollusc found living at three different vent fields at depths of 950-1178 m. This new chiton is a member of the small lepidopleuran family Protochitonidae and is morphologically similar to Hanleyella japonica Saito, 1997. The two species differ in small morphological differences of the valve shape and elevation, are divergent in the standard molecular barcoding mitochondrial gene cytochrome oxidase I (COI), and furthermore the known distribution range of H.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Anim Ecol
July 2015
Ocean and Earth Science, University of Southampton, National Oceanography Centre Southampton, European Way, Southampton, SO14 3ZH, UK.
Few species of reptant decapod crustaceans thrive in the cold-stenothermal waters of the Southern Ocean. However, abundant populations of a new species of anomuran crab, Kiwa tyleri, occur at hydrothermal vent fields on the East Scotia Ridge. As a result of local thermal conditions at the vents, these crabs are not restricted by the physiological limits that otherwise exclude reptant decapods south of the polar front.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFZootaxa
January 2015
Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 7 Nanhai Road, Qingdao 266071, China.; Email:
Two deep-water species of caridean shrimps collected during recent dives by the Chinese manned submersible "Jiaolong" represents new records for the South China Sea: Alvinocaris longirostris Kikuchi & Ohta, 1995 (Alvinocarididae) and Acanthephyra faxoni Calman, 1939 (Acanthephyridae). Specimens of these two species were collected from Jiaolong Cold Seep I, off Guangdong Province, China (depth 1138 m). Alvinocaris longirostris is known to be associated with chemosynthetic community, whereas Acanthephyra faxoni is a bathypelagic inhabitant, of which the occurrence in seep site is merely opportunistic.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEnter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!