The role of sympagic meiofauna for the flow of organic matter and energy in the Antarctic and Arctic sea-ice foodwebs

两极海冰中的卤水通道是渐进性(冰联)细菌、藻类、原生动物和小型后生动物(小型后生动物)的栖息地，包括桡足类、扁足类、轮虫、线虫、线虫、裸枝动物和线虫。浮游藻类的初级生产构成了海冰食物网的基础，海冰食物网与远洋生态系统和更高的营养水平相联系。该项目旨在确定渐变小型底栖动物在有机物质和能量通过海冰食物网流动中所起的作用，这一点尚不清楚。提出的问题是：主要的渐变小型动物分类群的主要食物来源是什么？摄食率是多少，与食物和食草动物/捕食者的密度有什么功能关系？不同群落组成对放牧和捕食有什么影响？渐变小型动物对渐变群落的动态有何影响？这些问题是通过结合肠道内容物分析、生化分析、喂养实验和建模来解决的。研究结果将有助于理解冰盖海洋生态系统的功能生态。

The brine channels in sea ice of both polar regions are the habitat of sympagic (iceassociated) bacteria, algae, protozoans and small metazoans (meiofauna), including copepods, plathyelminthes, rotifers, nematodes, cnidarians, nudibranchs and ctenophores. Primary production of sympagic algae forms the basis of the sea-ice food web, which is coupled to the pelagic ecosystem and higher trophic levels. This project aims to determine the, as yet unknown, role of sympagic meiofauna for the flow of organic matter and energy through the sea-ice food web. The questions raised are: What are the major food sources of the dominant sympagic meiofauna taxa? What are the ingestion rates, and what is the functional relationship to density of food and grazers / predators? What is the grazing and predation impact with different community compositions? How are the dynamics of the sympagic community influenced by sympagic meiofauna? These questions are addressed by a combination of gut content analyses, biochemical analyses, feeding experiments and modelling. The results will contribute to the understanding of the functional ecology of ice-covered ocean ecosystems.