Only constant propulsion downwards allows for its pelagic lifestyle. Recent results with in situ photonics revealed, that the long unknown habitat of juvenile krill are the ice caves of the packice zone around Antarctica. Inside the caves they apparently find shelter from their predators during the critical stages of their life history.
Oxygen depletion is speculated by many scientists.
Results of hydrodynamic measurements indicate, that the swimming activity might have a strong influence on the hydrodynamics of such a habitat, and receptively upon the oxygen and plankton regime in the cave. Each stage is graphically worked up and stored as a sequence of images for later animation editing. The derived mathematical relationships will be used to describe the microdynamics of oxygen distribution in the cave, with cave dimensions, water temperature, oxygen solubility and animal size as variables, oxygen consumption and swimming energetics as factors. The goal is a set of simple equations to simulate organism interactions and physiological budgeting on normal computers - for education and Antarctic ecosystem modeling. The resulting animations of the modeling, the experiments as well as in situ measurements from under the ice will be presented on a workstation monitor to compare.