Abstract
Very little is known about the composition and the annual cycle of zooplankton assemblages in the Red Sea, a confined water body characterized by a high biodiversity and endemism but at the same time one of the most understudied areas in the world in terms of marine biodiversity. This high diversity together with the lack of references for several of the groups poses a problem in obtaining basic information on zooplankton seasonal patterns. In the present work, we used high throughput sequencing to examine the temporal and spatial distribution of the zooplankton assemblages inhabiting the epipelagic zone in the central Red Sea. We provide baseline information of the seasonal patterns of the zooplankton community over one year. We show that the seasonal fluctuation of zooplankton communities living in the upper 100 meters of the water column is driven mainly by the annual changes in seawater temperature. Metabarcoding of zooplankton assemblages revealed 630 metazoan OTUs (97 % similarity) in five phyla, highlighting the richness of the Red Sea community. During colder months, communities were characterized by lower richness and higher biomass than communities found during the hot season. Throughout the year the zooplankton communities were dominated by the class Maxillopoda, mainly represented by copepods and class Hydrozoa. The rise in the water temperature favors the appearance of classes Malacostraca, Cephalopoda, Gastropoda and Saggitoidea.
Highlights
The zooplankton community acts as a link for the transfer of energy and material from protists to the higher trophic levels and has a pivotal role in the recycling and export of nutrients (Valiela, 1995; Mitra et al, 2014)
Overall the most diverse and dominant phylogenetic group in terms of operational taxonomic units (OTUs) was the Arthropoda accounting for 417 OTUs (66%) followed by Cnidaria (67 OTUs), which contributed more than 10% of the overall number of OTUs
The Arthropoda were comprised of 174 OTUs attributed to Malacostraca and 145 OTUs belonging to the class Maxillopoda, while the majority of the remaining OTUs could not be assigned at class level
Summary
The zooplankton community acts as a link for the transfer of energy and material from protists to the higher trophic levels and has a pivotal role in the recycling and export of nutrients (Valiela, 1995; Mitra et al, 2014). While zooplankton communities inhabiting temperate regions have been widely studied (e.g., Beaugrand, 2002; SiokouFrangou et al, 2010), some regions in the tropics, such as the Red Sea remain under studied. The Red Sea is considered unique in terms of its distinctive physico-chemical conditions that include year-round high levels of irradiance, high temperature and salinity levels, and low nutrient concentrations (Acosta et al, 2013; Raitsos et al, 2013). It harbors a unique fauna characterized by one of the highest levels of endemism for marine organisms in the world (DiBattista et al, 2016). Access to the main body of the Red Sea has been limited and as a consequence whole community studies of zooplankton are scarce and very little is known about the composition and the annual cycle of zooplankton communities in this marine environment
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