English (United Kingdom)

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/featured_content/oa?rat=en

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/highlighted_journal/

Global: Zendy Plus annual

Presents the access of premium content as premium feature

Premium Content

Presents the keyphrase highlighting as premium feature

Keyphrase Highlighting

Presents the summarisation as premium feature

Summarisation

Insights

Presents the pdf analysis as premium feature

PDF Analysis

Presents the zaia usage as premium feature

ZAIA

Global: Zendy Tools annual

Global: Zendy Free Plan

Global: Zendy Tools monthly

Global: Zendy Plus monthly

. Future deep-sea mining for polymetallic nodules in abyssal plains willnegatively impact the benthic ecosystem, but it is largely unclear whetherthis ecosystem will be able to recover from mining disturbance and if so, towhat extent and at what timescale. During the “DISturbance andreCOLonization” (DISCOL) experiment, a total of 22 % of the seafloorwithin a 10.8 km 2 circular area of the nodule-rich seafloor in the PeruBasin (SE Pacific) was ploughed in 1989 to bury nodules and mix the surfacesediment. This area was revisited 0.1, 0.5, 3, 7, and 26 years after thedisturbance to assess macrofauna, invertebrate megafauna and fish density anddiversity. We used this unique abyssal faunal time series to developcarbon-based food web models for each point in the time series using thelinear inverse modeling approach for sediments subjected to two disturbancelevels: (1) outside the plough tracks; not directly disturbed by plough, butprobably suffered from additional sedimentation; and (2) inside the ploughtracks. Total faunal carbon stock was always higher outside plough trackscompared with inside plough tracks. After 26 years, the carbon stock insidethe plough tracks was 54 % of the carbon stock outside plough tracks.Deposit feeders were least affected by the disturbance, with modeledrespiration, external predation, and excretion rates being reduced by only2.6 % inside plough tracks compared with outside plough tracks after26 years. In contrast, the respiration rate of filter and suspension feederswas 79.5 % lower in the plough tracks after 26 years. The “total systemthroughput” ( T ..), i.e., the total sum of modeled carbon flows in the food web,was higher throughout the time series outside plough tracks compared withthe corresponding inside plough tracks area and was lowest inside plough tracksdirectly after the disturbance (8.63  ×  10 −3 ±  1.58  ×  10 −5  mmol C m −2  d −1 ). Even 26 years after the DISCOLdisturbance, the discrepancy of T .. between outside and inside ploughtracks was still 56 %. Hence, C cycling within the faunal compartments ofan abyssal plain ecosystem remains reduced 26 years after physicaldisturbance, and a longer period is required for the system to recover fromsuch a small-scale sediment disturbance experiment.

Abyssal plain faunal carbon flows remain depressed 26 years after a simulated deep-sea mining disturbance