Environmental variability from internal waves affects benthic algal diversity in the littoral zone of a lake.
Published: 2006
Language: eng
Number of pages: 130
ISBN-13: 9780494211625
Description: Theoretical models and experiments suggest that environmental variability promotes the richness and evenness of species. This study tests whether environmental variability due to internal waves in a Canadian Shield lake affects the composition of natural benthic algal communities. Diatom richness and evenness increase with increasing environmental variability, but there is no relationship between environmental variability and total algal biomass. Mathematical models suggest that internal waves can shoal in this lake, transferring energy to the littoral zone, creating turbulence, and possibly resuspending sediments. This suggests that algal communities may be affected by fluctuations in several concurrent factors (temperature, currents, light, and nutrients). In this lake, the observed patterns of diversity cannot be explained by the patterns of temperature variability nor turbidity (and therefore not light and nutrients). I conclude that fluctuating currents from internal waves may be the most important structuring force in these natural benthic algal communities.
Notes: Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 45-03, page: 1372.

Thesis (M.Sc.)--University of Toronto, 2006.

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