Continuous moulting by Antarctic krill drives major pulses of carbon export in the north Scotia Sea, Southern Ocean.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 33247126.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41467-020-19956-7 and PMC identifier 7699634.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Antarctic krill play an important role in biogeochemical cycles and can potentially generate high-particulate organic carbon (POC) fluxes to the deep ocean. They also have an unusual trait of moulting continuously throughout their life-cycle. We determine the krill seasonal contribution to POC flux in terms of faecal pellets (FP), exuviae and carcasses from sediment trap samples collected in the Southern Ocean. We found that krill moulting generated an exuviae flux of similar order to that of FP, together accounting for 87% of an annual POC flux (22.8 g m<sup>-2</sup> y<sup>-1</sup>). Using an inverse modelling approach, we determined the krill population size necessary to generate this flux peaked at 261 g m<sup>-2</sup>. This study shows the important role of krill exuviae as a vector for POC flux. Since krill moulting cycle depends on temperature, our results highlight the sensitivity of POC flux to rapid regional environmental change.
Medical subject headings
- Carbon
- Carbon Cycle
- Euphausiacea
- Molting