Microbial gardening in the ocean's twilight zone: Detritivorous metazoans benefit from fragmenting, rather than ingesting, sinking detritus

Mayor, Daniel J. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1295-0041; Sanders, Richard ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6884-7131; Giering, Sarah L.C. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3090-1876; Anderson, Thomas R. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7408-1566. 2014 Microbial gardening in the ocean's twilight zone: Detritivorous metazoans benefit from fragmenting, rather than ingesting, sinking detritus. BioEssays, 36 (12). 1132-1137. https://doi.org/10.1002/bies.201400100

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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/bies.201400100

Abstract/Summary

Sinking organic particles transfer ∼10 gigatonnes of carbon into the deep ocean each year, keeping the atmospheric CO2 concentration significantly lower than would otherwise be the case. The exact size of this effect is strongly influenced by biological activity in the ocean's twilight zone (∼50–1,000 m beneath the surface). Recent work suggests that the resident zooplankton fragment, rather than ingest, the majority of encountered organic particles, thereby stimulating bacterial proliferation and the deep-ocean microbial food web. Here we speculate that this apparently counterintuitive behaviour is an example of ‘microbial gardening’, a strategy that exploits the enzymatic and biosynthetic capabilities of microorganisms to facilitate the ‘gardener's’ access to a suite of otherwise unavailable compounds that are essential for metazoan life. We demonstrate the potential gains that zooplankton stand to make from microbial gardening using a simple steady state model, and we suggest avenues for future research.

Item Type:	Publication - Article
Digital Object Identifier (DOI):	https://doi.org/10.1002/bies.201400100
ISSN:	02659247
Additional Keywords:	carbon cycling; detritus; mesopelagic; microbial loop; nutrition; polyunsaturated fatty acid; zooplankton
Date made live:	16 Sep 2014 15:41 +0 (UTC)
URI:	https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/508424

Item Type:

Publication - Article

Digital Object Identifier (DOI):

https://doi.org/10.1002/bies.201400100

ISSN:

02659247

Additional Keywords:

carbon cycling; detritus; mesopelagic; microbial loop; nutrition; polyunsaturated fatty acid; zooplankton

Date made live:

16 Sep 2014 15:41 +0 (UTC)

URI:

https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/508424