The presence of a riparian forest is one of the main factors that act directly on the ecology of a fluvial system, and the relation of the forest and the lotic environments might have an important influence on the distribution of the macroinvertebrates. In this context, the benthic macroinvertebrate communities in four low-order streams in São Paulo (Brazil) were analysed, with the aim of asses...

A natural reach of montane stream (length 96 m and 7 m width) was grided into 150 cells (2 × 2 m). Density and biomass of fish (Salmo trutta L. and Cottus poecilopus Heckel) were estimated at each cell, as well as stream depth, current velocity, Froude number, bed granulation and its roughness were measured, and benthic samples from exposed bricks were collected from mid August to early October...

Toxicity and temporal changes in toxicity of freshwater-marsh-microcosms containing South Louisiana Crude (SLC) or diesel fuel and treated with a cleaner or dispersant, were investigated using Chironomus tentans, Daphnia pulex, and Oryzias latipes. Bioassays used microcosm water (for D. pulex and O. latipes) or soil slurry (for C. tentans) taken 1,7, 31, and 186 days after treatment. SLC was le...

Published data on production of natural populations of benthic organisms were used to derive allometric equations relating annual production per unit biomass (P: B ratio) to mean individual body mass (time and biomass weighted) in the population on which production was measured. Separate equations were derived for meiofauna and macrofauna. Since no published data on production and size-structur...

Bottom trawl fishing has widespread impacts on benthic habitats and communities. The benthic response to trawling seems to be smaller or absent in areas exposed to high natural disturbance, leading to the hypothesis that natural and trawl disturbance affect benthic communities in a similar way. However, systematic tests of this hypothesis at large spatial scales and with data from sites spannin...

Marine sponges are major habitat-forming organisms in coastal benthic communities and have an ancient origin in evolution history. Here, we report significant accumulation of polyphosphate (polyP) granules in three common sponge species of the Caribbean coral reef. The identity of the polyP granules was confirmed by energy-dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) and by the fluorescence properties of the ...

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...

Our research examines the interactive effects of metal (Cu, Cr, Cd, Hg, and Pb) and diesel-fuel contaminants on the benthic food web of a coastal salt marsh and the specific role that Cu plays in this suite of contaminants. Specifically, we are examining how diesel and metal contaminants interact to influence the microbial (bacteria and microalgae), invertebrate, and juvenile fish components of...

Microscopic-scale processes significantly influence benthic marine ecosystems such as coral reefs and kelp forests. Due to the ocean's complex and dynamic nature, it is most informative to study these processes in the natural environment yet it is inherently difficult. Here we present a system capable of non-invasively imaging seafloor environments and organisms in situ at nearly micrometre res...

The existence of ancient deep-water lakes provides an opportunity to study the independent adaptation of aquatic organisms to pelagic, benthic, and rocky shore habitats. With improving resolution of their phylogenetic relationships, the many cichlid fish species endemic to the African Great Lakes Malawi, Tanganyika, and Victoria provide a significant resource for the comparative study of such e...