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AME Aquatic Microbial Ecology Contact the journal Facebook Twitter RSS Mailing List Subscribe to our mailing list via Mailchimp HomeLatest VolumeAbout the JournalEditorsSpecials AME 13:101-111 (1997) - doi:10.3354/ame013101 Role of experimental approaches in marine microbial ecology Duarte CM, Gasol JM, Vaqué D Examination of the contribution of experimental approaches to marine microbial ecology shows these approaches to receive 34.8% of the present effort in the field. Most of the experiments focus on bacteria or marine microbial communities and generally examine the importance of trophic interactions and associated flows of carbon and nutrients in these food webs. Microbial ecologists use experimental units ranging 8 orders of magnitude in size (10-3 to 105 l), with a geometric median size of 0.8 l, and an exponential decline in the number of experiments performed at increasingly larger and smaller scales. The duration of experiments is scaled linearly with the characteristic linear dimension of the experimental units, corresponding to 20 d for each meter in characteristic dimension. The majority (70.3%) of the experiments performed in the past 5 yr used natural communities or organisms, particularly in mesocosm (>103 l) experiments. Most (84.5%) of the experiments are conducted under closely controlled conditions in the laboratory and involve the manipulation of particles, resources and the food web structure, usually manipulating a single factor at a time, the fraction of experiments published declining exponentially with the increase in the numbers of factors tested. A major difference between experimental marine microbial ecology and other disciplines of marine ecology is the remarkable paucity of field experiments (only 2.6% of the experiments in marine microbial ecology), where only the treatment factors are controlled, and the total absence of ecosystem experiments, which are field experiments where the treatment is applied to an entire ecosystem. Experimental approaches have played an important role in the development of marine microbial ecology, but no single experiment has had a large impact on the progress of the field, suggesting that the experiments so far conducted in marine microbial ecology have failed to provide the crucial tests of the main hypotheses needed to progress through strong inferences. The future effectiveness of experimental marine microbial ecology will be substantially enhanced through a larger allocation of efforts towards field experiments, designed to interplay with observational and comparative approaches, leading to conclusive tests of key hypotheses and paradigms through carefully designed, crucial ecosystem experiments. Experiments · Marine microbial ecology · Design · Impact · Prospect Full text in pdf format PreviousNextExport citation RSS - Facebook - Tweet - linkedIn Cited by Published in AME Vol. 13, No. 1. Publication date: July 24, 1997 Print ISSN: 0948-3055; Online ISSN: 1616-1564 Copyright © 1997 Inter-Research.
Warming occurs particularly fast in the Arctic and exerts profound effects on arctic ecosystems. Sea ice-associated ecosystems are projected to decline but reduced arctic sea ice cover also increases the solar radiation reaching the coastal seafloors with the potential for expansion of vegetated habitats, i.e. kelp forests and seagrass meadows. These habitats support key ecosystem functions, some of which may mitigate effects of climate change. Therefore, the likely expansion of vegetated coastal habitats in the Arctic will generate new productive ecosystems, offer habitat for a number of invertebrate and vertebrate species, including provision of refugia for calcifiers from possible threats from ocean acidification, contribute to enhance CO2 sequestration and protect the shoreline from erosion. The development of models allowing quantitative forecasts of the future of vegetated arctic ecosystems requires that key hypotheses underlying such forecasts be tested. Here we propose a set of three key testable hypotheses along with a research agenda for testing them using a broad diversity of approaches, including analyses of paleo-records, space for-time substitutions and experimental studies. The research agenda proposed would provide a solid underpinning to guide forecasts on the spread of marine macrophytes onto the Arctic with climate change and contribute to balance our understanding of climate change impacts on the arctic ecosystem through a focus on the role of engineering species. Anticipating these changes in ecosystem structure and function is key to develop managerial strategies to maximize these ecosystem services in a future warmer Arctic.
Trabajo presentado en el COMPLEX NETWORKS 2020 (The Ninth International Conference on Complex Networks and their Applications), celebrado en Madrid del 1 al 3 de diciembre de 2020.
Seagrasses are important marine foundation species that are reported to be declining worldwide, with almost 15% of species considered threatened. Seagrasses are highly productive plants that reconfigure water flow and influence nutrient cycling, as well as provide critical habitat for a wide array of fish and invertebrate species. Yet, many of these seagrass‐dependent species, including economically important fishes and invertebrates, are themselves in danger of overexploitation or extinction. In fact, there is on average more than one threatened associated species for every seagrass species across the globe. Links between threatened seagrasses and their dependent communities illustrate the importance of an ecosystem‐based management approach that incorporates interdependencies and facilitation among species.
where N = number of sampling stations; t = Student's t at a given probability level; S = standard deviation, X = estimated true population mean; d = permissible error of the final mean. Thus, the number of sampling stations necessary to characterize the mean macrophyte standing crop changes proportionally to the square of the coeffi cient of variation and to the inverse of the square of the permissible error (Figure 1). Because the coefficient of variation associated with the mean macrophyte standing crop is often> 50 %, the number of sampling stations necessary to estimate the mean macrophyte standing crop, especially with a permissible error of 10 % as is often re- ABSTRACT 10% Data from 55 Florida lakes were used to demonstrate that the maximum measured standing crop of emergent, floating-leaved, and submersed plants can be used to pro vide a simple characterization of macrophyte standing crops in the littoral zones of lakes. The maximum standing crop was strongly related to the mean standing crop of emergent (R2 = 0.83), floating-leaved (R2 = 0.64), and submersed (R2 = 0.85) macrophytes, and there was also a strong relationship (R2 = 0.79) when data from all plant types were combined. Our best-fit regression equations were In EB = 1.07 In MEB - 1.19, In FB = 1.28 In MFB - 2.73, In SB = 1.20 In MSB - 1.98, and In TMB = 1.20 In MTMB - 2.11 where EB, FB, SB, and TMB are the average standing crops (g dry wt m- 2 ) of emergent, float ing-leaved, submersed, and total macrophytes respectively, and MEB, MFB, MSB, and MTMB are the maximum standing crops measured for the different groups. Stand ard errors of estimates for the average standing crops of the different plant types in individual lakes were of similar magnitude to the errors of estimates obtained for the <JJ mean-maximum standing crop regression equations. ~ These analyses suggest that the maximum standing crop ~ of aquatic macrophytes can provide useful information to ~ characterize macrophyte standing crop in the littoral zone of lakes. ~ E
