Shannon Point Marine Center Faculty Publications

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

3-2012

Keywords

Larval disperal, Hydrothermal vents

Abstract

Visually striking faunal communities of high abundance and biomass cluster around hydrothermal vents, but these animals don’t spend all of their lives on the seafloor. Instead, they spend a portion of their lives as tiny larvae in the overlying water column. Dispersal of larvae among vent sites is critical for population maintenance, colonization of new vents, and recolonization of disturbed vents. Historically, studying larvae has been challenging, especially in the deep sea. Advances in the last decade in larval culturing technologies and more integrated, interdisciplinary time-series observations are providing new insights into how hydrothermal vent animals use the water column to maintain their populations across ephemeral and disjunct habitats. Larval physiology and development are often constrained by evolutionary history, resulting in larvae using a diverse set of dispersal strategies to interact with the surrounding currents at different depths. These complex biological and oceanographic interactions translate the reproductive output of adults in vent communities into a dynamic supply of settling larvae from sources near and far.

Publication Title

Oceanography

Volume

25

Issue

1

First Page

256

Last Page

268

Required Publisher's Statement

https://doi.org/10.5670/oceanog.2012.24

Published by the Oceanography Society

Comments

Special Issue: Oceanic Spreading Center Processes: Ridge 2000 Program Research

This article was recommended by the Faculty of 1000.

Subjects - Topical (LCSH)

Larvae--Dispersal; Hydrothermal circulation (Oceanography); Hydrothermal vent animals

Genre/Form

articles

Type

Text

Rights

Copying of this document in whole or in part is allowable only for scholarly purposes. It is understood, however, that any copying or publication of this document for commercial purposes, or for financial gain, shall not be allowed without the author’s written permission.

Language

English

Format

application/pdf

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