Dataset Information

Effect of grazing-mediated dimethyl sulfide (DMS) production on the swimming behavior of the copepod Calanus helgolandicus.

ABSTRACT: Chemical interactions play a fundamental role in the ecology of marine foodwebs. Dimethyl sulfide (DMS) is a ubiquitous marine trace gas that acts as a bioactive compound by eliciting foraging behavior in a range of marine taxa including the copepod Temora longicornis. Production of DMS can rapidly increase following microzooplankton grazing on phytoplankton. Here, we investigated whether grazing-induced DMS elicits an increase in foraging behavior in the copepod Calanus helgolandicus. We developed a semi-automated method to quantify the effect of grazing-mediated DMS on the proportion of the time budget tethered females allocate towards slow swimming, typically associated with feeding. The pooled data showed no differences in the proportion of the 25 min time budget allocated towards slow swimming between high (23.6 ± 9.74%) and low (29.1 ± 18.33%) DMS treatments. However, there was a high degree of variability between behavioral responses of individual copepods. We discuss the need for more detailed species-specific studies of individual level responses of copepods to chemical signals at different spatial scales to improve our understanding of chemical interactions between copepods and their prey.

SUBMITTER: Breckels MN

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3736436 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Effect of grazing-mediated dimethyl sulfide (DMS) production on the swimming behavior of the copepod Calanus helgolandicus.

Breckels Mark N MN Bode Nikolai W F NW Codling Edward A EA Steinke Michael M

Marine drugs 20130715 7

Chemical interactions play a fundamental role in the ecology of marine foodwebs. Dimethyl sulfide (DMS) is a ubiquitous marine trace gas that acts as a bioactive compound by eliciting foraging behavior in a range of marine taxa including the copepod Temora longicornis. Production of DMS can rapidly increase following microzooplankton grazing on phytoplankton. Here, we investigated whether grazing-induced DMS elicits an increase in foraging behavior in the copepod Calanus helgolandicus. We develo ...[more]

PMID: 23860240

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Project description:Top-down grazer control of cyanobacteria is a controversial topic due to conflicting reports of success and failure as well as a bias toward studies in temperate climates with large generalist grazers like Daphnia. In the tropical lowland lakes of Brazil, calanoid copepods of the Notodiaptomus complex dominate zooplankton and co-exist in high abundance with permanent blooms of toxic cyanobacteria, raising questions for grazer effects on bloom dynamics (i.e., top-down control vs. facilitation of cyanobacterial dominance). Accordingly, the effect of copepod grazing on the relative abundance of Microcystis co-cultured with a eukaryotic phytoplankton (Cryptomonas) was evaluated in a series of 6-day laboratory experiments. Grazer effects were tested in incubations where the growth of each phytoplankton in the presence or absence of the copepod Notodiaptomus iheringi was monitored in 1 L co-cultures, starting with a 6-fold initial dominance of Cryptomonas by biomass. Compared to the no grazer controls, N. iheringi reduced the growth of both phytoplankton, but Cryptomonas growth was reduced to negative values while Microcystis growth continued positively despite grazers. Hence, in a matter of 6 days selective grazing by N. iheringi increased the biomass of Microcystis relative to Cryptomonas by an order of magnitude compared to controls, and thus, facilitated the dominance of this cyanobacterium. To account for the potential effect of allelopathy, we performed a secondary experiment comparing the abundance and growth rate of Microcystis and Cryptomonas in single and mixed co-cultures in the absence of grazers. The growth rate of Microcystis was unaffected by the presence or relative abundance of Cryptomonas, and vice versa, indicating no allelopathic effects. Our results suggest that selectively grazing zooplankton may facilitate cyanobacteria blooms by grazing on their eukaryotic phytoplankton competitors in nature. Given that selective grazers predominate zooplankton biomass in warmer waters, grazer facilitation of blooms may be a common but poorly understood regulator of plankton dynamics in a warmer and more eutrophic world.

Dataset Information

Effect of grazing-mediated dimethyl sulfide (DMS) production on the swimming behavior of the copepod Calanus helgolandicus.

Publications

Effect of grazing-mediated dimethyl sulfide (DMS) production on the swimming behavior of the copepod Calanus helgolandicus.

Similar Datasets

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