Questioning the Rise of Gelatinous Zooplankton in the World's Oceans

Autores: Robert Condon ... [et al.]. -- 10 páginas, 5 figurasDuring the past several decades, high numbers of gelatinous zooplankton species have been reported in many estuarine and coastal ecosystems.\udCoupled with media-driven public perception, a paradigm has evolved in which the global ocean ecosystems are thought to be heading toward\udbeing\uddominated by “nuisance” jellyfish. We question this current paradigm by presenting a broad overview of gelatinous zooplankton in a historical\udcontext to develop the hypothesis that population changes reflect the human-mediated alteration of global ocean ecosystems. To this end,\udwe synthesize information related to the evolutionary context of contemporary gelatinous zooplankton blooms, the human frame of reference for\udchanges in gelatinous zooplankton populations, and whether sufficient data are available to have established the paradigm. We conclude that the\udcurrent paradigm in which it is believed that there has been a global increase in gelatinous zooplankton is unsubstantiated, and we develop a strategy\udfor addressing the critical questions about long-term, human-related changes in the sea as they relate to gelatinous zooplankton blooms.La financiación del National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis y del Jellyfish Working Group proviene de la Nacional Science Foundation Grant no. DEB-94-21535, de la Universidad de California en Santa Bárbara, y desde el Estado de California. Michael N. Dawson fue apoyado en parte por la Nacional Science Foundation Grant no. DEB-07-17071.Peer reviewe