The Roles of Sea-Ice, Light and Sedimentation in Structuring Shallow Antarctic Benthic Communities
On polar coasts, seasonal sea-ice duration strongly influences shallow marine environments by affecting environmental conditions, such as light, sedimentation, and physical disturbance. Sea-ice dynamics are changing in response to climate, but there is limited understanding of how this might affect...
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:5226713 2023-05-15T13:55:36+02:00 The Roles of Sea-Ice, Light and Sedimentation in Structuring Shallow Antarctic Benthic Communities Clark, Graeme F. Stark, Jonathan S. Palmer, Anne S. Riddle, Martin J. Johnston, Emma L. 2017-01-11 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5226713/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28076438 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0168391 en eng Public Library of Science http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5226713/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28076438 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0168391 © 2017 Clark et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. CC-BY Research Article Text 2017 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0168391 2017-02-05T01:19:38Z On polar coasts, seasonal sea-ice duration strongly influences shallow marine environments by affecting environmental conditions, such as light, sedimentation, and physical disturbance. Sea-ice dynamics are changing in response to climate, but there is limited understanding of how this might affect shallow marine environments and benthos. Here we present a unique set of physical and biological data from a single region of Antarctic coast, and use it to gain insights into factors shaping polar benthic communities. At sites encompassing a gradient of sea-ice duration, we measured temporal and spatial variation in light and sedimentation and hard-substrate communities at different depths and substrate orientations. Biological trends were highly correlated with sea-ice duration, and appear to be driven by opposing gradients in light and sedimentation. As sea-ice duration decreased, there was increased light and reduced sedimentation, and concurrent shifts in community structure from invertebrate to algal dominance. Trends were strongest on shallower, horizontal surfaces, which are most exposed to light and sedimentation. Depth and substrate orientation appear to mediate exposure of benthos to these factors, thereby tempering effects of sea-ice and increasing biological heterogeneity. However, while light and sedimentation both varied spatially with sea-ice, their dynamics differed temporally. Light was sensitive to the site-specific date of sea-ice breakout, whereas sedimentation fluctuated at a regional scale coincident with the summer phytoplankton bloom. Sea-ice duration is clearly the overarching force structuring these shallow Antarctic benthic communities, but direct effects are imposed via light and sedimentation, and mediated by habitat characteristics. Text Antarc* Antarctic Sea ice PubMed Central (PMC) Antarctic PLOS ONE 12 1 e0168391 |
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Research Article Clark, Graeme F. Stark, Jonathan S. Palmer, Anne S. Riddle, Martin J. Johnston, Emma L. The Roles of Sea-Ice, Light and Sedimentation in Structuring Shallow Antarctic Benthic Communities |
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Research Article |
description |
On polar coasts, seasonal sea-ice duration strongly influences shallow marine environments by affecting environmental conditions, such as light, sedimentation, and physical disturbance. Sea-ice dynamics are changing in response to climate, but there is limited understanding of how this might affect shallow marine environments and benthos. Here we present a unique set of physical and biological data from a single region of Antarctic coast, and use it to gain insights into factors shaping polar benthic communities. At sites encompassing a gradient of sea-ice duration, we measured temporal and spatial variation in light and sedimentation and hard-substrate communities at different depths and substrate orientations. Biological trends were highly correlated with sea-ice duration, and appear to be driven by opposing gradients in light and sedimentation. As sea-ice duration decreased, there was increased light and reduced sedimentation, and concurrent shifts in community structure from invertebrate to algal dominance. Trends were strongest on shallower, horizontal surfaces, which are most exposed to light and sedimentation. Depth and substrate orientation appear to mediate exposure of benthos to these factors, thereby tempering effects of sea-ice and increasing biological heterogeneity. However, while light and sedimentation both varied spatially with sea-ice, their dynamics differed temporally. Light was sensitive to the site-specific date of sea-ice breakout, whereas sedimentation fluctuated at a regional scale coincident with the summer phytoplankton bloom. Sea-ice duration is clearly the overarching force structuring these shallow Antarctic benthic communities, but direct effects are imposed via light and sedimentation, and mediated by habitat characteristics. |
format |
Text |
author |
Clark, Graeme F. Stark, Jonathan S. Palmer, Anne S. Riddle, Martin J. Johnston, Emma L. |
author_facet |
Clark, Graeme F. Stark, Jonathan S. Palmer, Anne S. Riddle, Martin J. Johnston, Emma L. |
author_sort |
Clark, Graeme F. |
title |
The Roles of Sea-Ice, Light and Sedimentation in Structuring Shallow Antarctic Benthic Communities |
title_short |
The Roles of Sea-Ice, Light and Sedimentation in Structuring Shallow Antarctic Benthic Communities |
title_full |
The Roles of Sea-Ice, Light and Sedimentation in Structuring Shallow Antarctic Benthic Communities |
title_fullStr |
The Roles of Sea-Ice, Light and Sedimentation in Structuring Shallow Antarctic Benthic Communities |
title_full_unstemmed |
The Roles of Sea-Ice, Light and Sedimentation in Structuring Shallow Antarctic Benthic Communities |
title_sort |
roles of sea-ice, light and sedimentation in structuring shallow antarctic benthic communities |
publisher |
Public Library of Science |
publishDate |
2017 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5226713/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28076438 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0168391 |
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Antarctic |
geographic_facet |
Antarctic |
genre |
Antarc* Antarctic Sea ice |
genre_facet |
Antarc* Antarctic Sea ice |
op_relation |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5226713/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28076438 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0168391 |
op_rights |
© 2017 Clark et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0168391 |
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PLOS ONE |
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12 |
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e0168391 |
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