Fatty acid ecology of plankton communities. Progress report, May 1, 1979-April 30, 1980

• Main Author: Jeffries, H P
• Other Authors: United States. Department of Energy.
• Format: Report
• Language: English
• Published: University of Rhode Island. Graduate School of Oceanography. 1980
• Subjects: Species Diversity; Aquatic Organisms; Organic Compounds; Variations; Communities; Surface Waters; Coastal Waters; Chemical Composition; 59 Basic Biological Sciences; North Atlantic Region; 550200 > Biochemistry; Plankton; Organic Acids; Carboxylic Acids; Usa 520100* > Environment; Aquatic > Basic Studies > (-1989); Correlations; Zooplankton; Population Dynamics; Rhode Island; North America; 54 Environmental Sciences; Estuaries; Block Island; Green Hill; North Atlantic
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.2172/5424449; https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc1069264/

The principal hypothesis addressed in this study states that community variability is related to fatty acid structure. As a test of this idea, the zooplankton in three regimes of increasing physical severity (Block Island Sound, Narragansett Bay and Green Hill Pond) are being compared. Measurements were made on the physical environment, on standing crop and on fatty acid composition in both the phytoplankton-microzooplankton and macrozooplankton. Fatty acid variation in these communities displays a unique trajectory in time at each location. Environmental change and biochemical variability are directly related. The resulting biochemical message is complex but apparently highly informative. Patterns of variation in some fatty acids are affected most strongly by physical environmental parameters whereas the variation of other fatty acids is more responsive to differences in species composition, diversity and food web relationships. Taken together, these two aspects of biochemical pattern appear to characterize complex species assemblages. The result offers a new strategem for convenient assessment of the ever changing state in a natural community.