Geographical and Seasonal Thermal Sensitivity of Grazing Pressure by Microzooplankton in Contrasting Marine Ecosystems.

ABSTRACT: Grazing pressure, estimated as the ratio between microzooplankton grazing and phytoplankton growth rates (g:μ), is a strong determinant of microbial food-web structure and element cycling in the upper ocean. It is generally accepted that g is more sensitive to temperature than μ, but it remains unknown how the thermal dependence (activation energy, E _a) of g:μ varies over spatial and temporal scales. To tackle this uncertainty, we used an extensive literature analysis obtaining 751 paired rate estimates of μ and g from dilution experiments performed throughout the world's marine environments. On a geographical scale, we found a stimulatory effect of temperature in polar open-ocean (∼0.5 eV) and tropical coastal (∼0.2 eV) regions, and an inhibit

SUBMITTER: Cabrerizo MJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8287633 | biostudies-literature | 2021

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature