Competition as a mechanism of adaptation to environmental stress in outdoor cultures of marine diatoms
Year: 1984
Type: article
Abstract: Effects were investigated of PO,-P limitation and climate on natural assemblages of marine diatoms grown in outdoor semicontinuous cultures.The cultures were grown at 3 dilution rates (1.7; 0.851; 0.32 doublings d-l) throughout the year.Temperature dependent maximum growth rate of cultures was predicted by the Eppley equation.Nutrient limitation measured as N : P and Si : P cellular ratios increased with decreasing dilution rate or increasing temperature in a manner analogous to that in single-species cultures studied by other workers.However, species dominance changed with changing nutrient stress.Skeletonema costatum was dominant at high dilution rates; it was replaced by Chaetoceros spp.and then Cylindrotheca closterjum at lower dilution rates.Thalassiosira spp.COexisted with S. costatum or Chaetoceros spp. at low light intensities and temperatures.It is concluded that multi-species cultures adapt to nutrient stress by species replacement rather than physiological adaptation of a single species.
Source: Marine Ecology Progress Series
DOI: 10.3354/meps016219
Authors: CM Roden, KW O'Mahony
Institution: Ollscoil na Gaillimhe – University of Galway
Language: English
Subfield: Oceanography
Field: Earth and Planetary Sciences
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2007755392