[en] We used high-resolution imagery within a Geographic Information System (GIS), free gas and porewater analyses and animal bulk stable isotope measurements to characterize the biotic and abiotic aspects of the newly discovered Vestbrona Carbonate Field (VCF) seep site on the Norwegian shelf (63°28′N, 6° 31′E, ∿270 m water depth). Free gas was mainly composed of microbial methane. Sediment porewater sulfide concentrations were in the millimolar range and thus high enough to sustain seep chemosymbiotrophic animals. Nonetheless, the VCF lacked chemosymbiotrophic animals despite an abundance of methane-derived carbonate crusts which are formed by the same anaerobic processes that sustain chemosymbiotrophic animals at seeps. Furthermore, none of the sampled taxa, across various trophic guilds exhibited a detectable contribution of chemosynthetically fixed carbon to their diets based on bulk stable isotope values, suggesting a predominantly photosynthetic source of carbon to the VCF seep food web. We link the absence of chemosymbiotrophic animals to highly localized methane flow pathways, which may act as a “shunt-bypass” of the anaerobic oxidation of methane (AOM) and by extension sulfide generation, thus leading to sediment sulfide concentrations that are highly heterogeneous over very short lateral distances, inhibiting the successful colonization of chemosymbiotrophic animals at the VCF seep. Instead, the seep hosted diverse biological communities, consisting of heterotrophic benthic fauna, including long lived taxa, such as soft corals (e.g., Paragorgia arborea) and stony corals (i.e., Desmophyllum pertusum, formerly known as Lophelia pertusa). Compared to the surrounding non-seep seafloor, we measured heightened megafaunal density at the seep, which we attribute to increased habitat heterogeneity and the presence of a variety of hard substrates (i.e., methane-derived authigenic carbonates, dropstones and coral rubble), particularly since the most abundant taxa all belonged to the phylum Porifera. Compared to the surrounding non-seep seafloor, marine litter was denser within the VCF seep, which we link to the more variable local topography due to authigenic carbonates, which can rip off parts of bottom trawling nets thereby making the seep act as catchment area for marine litter.
Research Center/Unit :
FOCUS - Freshwater and OCeanic science Unit of reSearch - ULiège MARE - Centre Interfacultaire de Recherches en Océanologie - ULiège
Sinner, Melina; National Oceanography Center, University of Southampton, Southampton, United Kingdom ; Plentzia Marine Station, University of the Basque Country, Plentzia, Spain ; Faculty of Sciences, University of Liège, Liège, Belgium
Hong, Wei Li; Department of Geological Sciences, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden
Michel, Loïc ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Département de Biologie, Ecologie et Evolution > Systématique et diversité animale ; Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS), Ifremer, UMR6197 BEEP (Biologie et Ecologie des Ecosystèmes marins Profonds), University Brest, Plouzané, France
Vadakkepuliyambatta, Sunil; National Centre for Polar and Ocean Research (NCPOR), Ministry of Earth Sciences, Government of India, Vasco-da-Gama, India
Knies, Jochen; Geological Survey of Norway, Trondheim, Norway ; iC3: The Centre for ice, Cryosphere, Carbon, and Climate, The Department of Geosciences, UiT The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway
Sen, Arunima; Department of Arctic Biology, The University Centre in Svalbard, Longyearbyen, Norway ; Department of Bioscience and Aquaculture, Nord University, Bodø, Norway
Language :
English
Title :
Lack of detectable chemosynthesis at a sponge dominated subarctic methane seep
We would like to thank the captain and crew of the R/V G. O. Sars (University of Bergen), the ROV Ægir team, and the scientific team of the 20-0 CAGE cruise from which data for this project was gathered. We thank Henning Reiss and Morten Krogstad for helping with organization and logistics and Nord University for hosting the first author and providing office space and technical equipment. We thank the MER Consortium and Erasmus+ for funding the first author’s stay at Nord University and Brian Sevin for providing guidance and suggestions. We are grateful to Henning Reiss, Sabine Cochrane, Paul Renaud and Bodil Bluhm for help with identifying animals such as the “fan animal.”We sincerely thank Spirit Energy Ltd. (now: Sval Energy AS) for supporting the ROV expedition onboard R/V G.O. Sars. The research was supported by the Research Council of Norway (RCN) (project numbers 223259, and 332635). The funder was not involved in the study design, collection, analysis, interpretation of data, the writing of this article or the decision to submit it for publication.We sincerely thank Spirit Energy Ltd. (now: Sval Energy AS) for supporting the ROV expedition onboard R/V G.O. Sars. The research was supported by the Research Council of Norway (RCN) (project numbers 223259, and 332635). The funder was not involved in the study design, collection, analysis, interpretation of data, the writing of this article or the decision to submit it for publication.
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