Macro- and megafauna communities in three deep basins of the South-East Atlantic |
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| Institution: | 1. UMR 7138 Evolution Paris-Seine, Equipe Biologie de la Mangrove, Université des Antilles, UFR des Sciences Exactes et Naturelles, Département de Biologie, BP 592, 97 159 Pointe-à-Pitre, Guadeloupe, France;2. NIOZ Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, Department of Marine Microbiology, 4400 AC, Yerseke, The Netherlands;1. State Key Laboratory of Systematic and Evolutionary Botany, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xiangshan, Beijing 100093, PR China;2. University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, PR China;3. Department of Biological Sciences, Macquarie University, North Ryde, NSW 2109, Australia;4. Centre for Past Climate Change, School of Archaeology, Geography and Environmental Sciences, University of Reading, Whiteknights, Reading, UK;5. Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum, Senckenberganlage 25, D-60325, Frankfurt/Main, Germany;6. Department of Palaeontology, University of Vienna, Althanstrasse 14, Vienna A-1090, Austria;7. Central Department of Geology, Tribhuvan University, Kirtipur, Kathmandu, Nepal;8. Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeobotany, University Road, Lucknow 226007, India;1. Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, Palacky University, 17. listopadu 50, 771 46 Olomouc, Czech Republic;2. Senckenberg Deutsches Entomologisches Institut, Eberswalder Strasse 90, 15374 Müncheberg, Germany;3. Institute of Entomology, College of Plant Protection, Southwest University, Beibei, Chongqing 400716, PR China. |
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| Abstract: | During ‘Meteor’ expedition ‘DIVA 2’ in 2005 the abyssal macro- and megafauna communities were studied in the northern Cape Basin, in the northern Angola Basin and in the eastern and western Guinea Basin. Water depths varied between 5040 and 5670 m.Surface deposit feeding or predatory ophiuroids dominated the megafaunal community in the northern Cape Basin, sponges, sipunculids and fish in the northern Angola Basin, and asteroids, crustaceans and fish in the eastern Guinea Basin, while in the western Guinea Basin sipunculids dominated.In the northern Cape Basin, peracarid crustaceans were the dominant macrofaunal group, followed by polychaetes and bivalves. In the Guinea Basin, polychaetes, peracarid crustaceans and bivalves dominated, although omnivorous or predatory free-living nematodes of macrofaunal size (>0.5 mm) made up 40–60% of the total abundance, with maxima in the western basin.The chlorophyll a content of sediments was lower in the northern Cape and Angola Basins than in the Guinea Basin, which was consistent with the differences in water masses, primary production and flux rate of organic matter in the three basins of the South-East Atlantic. The differences in structure and function of the macro- and megafauna communities in the three basins correlated with the differences in the amount of food reaching the seafloor in tropical and subtropical settings. |
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| Keywords: | TOC Food availability Deep sea Cape Basin Angola Basin Guinea Basin |
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