Although species-area relationship (SAR) is among the most extensively studied patterns in ecology, studies on aquatic and/or microbial systems are seriously underrepresented in the literature. We tested the algal SAR in lakes, pools and ponds of various sizes (10-2-108 m2) and similar hydromorphological and trophic characteristics using species-specific data and functional groups. Besides the ...

We have previously shown that primary productivity in San Francisco Bay, USA, is highly correlated with phytoplankton biomass B (chlorophyll a concentration) and an index of light availability in the photic zone, Z,I, (photic depth times surface irradiance). To test the generality of this relation, we compiled data from San Francisco Bay and 5 other USA estuarine systems (Neuse and South Rivers...

The limnological characteristics and the phytoplankton community of the pelagic region of the São João River, tributary of the Iguaçu River, Iguaçu National Park were analyzed from August 2008 to July 2009. 221 taxa were identified and the Bacillariophyceae class was the most representative. Bacillariophyceae and Chrysophyceae were the dominant classes in density and Bacillariophyceae in biovol...

Predators’ switching towards the most abundant prey is a mechanism that stabilizes population dynamics and helps overcome competitive exclusion of species in food webs. Current formulations of active prey-switching, however, display non-maximal feeding in which the predators’ total ingestion decays exponentially with the number prey species (i.e. the diet breadth) even though the total prey bio...

The fluxes of energy, matter, and organisms are important structuring forces of metaecosystems. Such ecosystem fluxes likely interact with environmental heterogeneity and differentially affect the diversity of multiple communities. In an aquatic mesocosm experiment, we tested how ecosystem flux and patch heterogeneity affected the diversity of bacteria, phytoplankton, and zooplankton metacommun...

Contemporary insights from evolutionary ecology suggest that population divergence in ecologically important traits within predators can generate diversifying ecological selection on local community structure. Many studies acknowledging these effects of intraspecific variation assume that local populations are situated in communities that are unconnected to similar communities within a shared r...

 Phytoplankton growth and microzooplankton grazing were investigated at one station in the Homa Lagoon from February to January in 2006-2007. Our results showed significant seasonal variations in phytoplankton dynamics. Microzooplankton was mainly composed of dinoflagellates and tintinnid ciliates and nauplii. Microzooplankton grazing increased with increasing of temperature. Grazing ra...

We have a limited understanding of the consequences of variations in microbial biodiversity on ocean ecosystem functioning and global biogeochemical cycles. A core process is macronutrient uptake by microorganisms, as the uptake of nutrients controls ocean CO2 fixation rates in many regions. Here, we ask whether variations in ocean phytoplankton biodiversity lead to novel functional relationshi...