Photoperiod-driven rhythms reveal multi-decadal stability of phytoplankton communities in a highly fluctuating coastal environment.

ABSTRACT: Phytoplankton play a pivotal role in global biogeochemical and trophic processes and provide essential ecosystem services. However, there is still no broad consensus on how and to what extent their community composition responds to environmental variability. Here, high-frequency oceanographic and biological data collected over more than 25 years in a coastal Mediterranean site are used to shed light on the temporal patterns of phytoplankton species and assemblages in their environmental context. Because of the proximity to the coast and due to large-scale variations, environmental conditions showed variability on the short and long-term scales. Nonetheless, an impressive regularity characterised the annual occurrence of phytoplankton species and their assemblages, which translated into the

SUBMITTER: Longobardi L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8913669 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature