A Minireview on Biodiscovery in Antarctic Marine Benthic Invertebrates

Chemical Interactions in Antarctic Marine Benthic Ecosystems

Overview of the chemical ecology of benthic marine invertebrates along the western Antarctic peninsula.

Thirteen years ago in a review that appeared in the American Zoologist, we presented the first survey of the chemical and ecological bioactivity of Antarctic shallow-water marine invertebrates. In essence, we reported that despite theoretical predictions to the contrary the incidence of chemical defenses among sessile and sluggish Antarctic marine invertebrates was widespread. Since that time w...

The Distribution of Antarctic Marine Benthic Communities

The Polar Frontal Zone, although predominantly a surface feature, forms a natural northernmost boundary for defining the Southern Ocean, and relatively few benthic organisms have distributions which cross this boundary. Many Antarctic benthic plants and animals have circumpolar distributions but some broad geographical subdivisions may be made. Detailed studies of community distribution are few...

Reproductive Strategies of Marine Benthic Invertebrates : A Settlement - Timing Hypothesis

Evidence for nudibranch molluscs is presented which shows a clear relationship between egg-size and developmental mode (planktotrophic, lecithotrophic and direct development), egg-size and development time, and thereby larval strategy and development time. Egg-to-juvenile periods differ significantly according to strategy, with lecithotrophic pelagic development being the briefest, and planktot...

On the origin of Antarctic marine benthic community structure.

Environmental conditions fostering marine communities around Antarctica differ fundamentally from those in the rest of the world's oceans, particularly in terms of pronounced climatic fluctuations and extreme cold. Here, we argue that the rarity of pelagic larval stages in Antarctic marine benthic invertebrate species is a consequence of evolutionary temperature adaptation and that this has gre...