Description: Highlights: • We used indoor mesocosms to test the impact of warming on plankton communities. • Different stages of phytoplankton bloom were analysed. • Increased temperature and zooplankton grazing had similar effects on phytoplankton. • Warming and increased zooplankton density decreased phytoplankton richness. • Warming and increased zooplankton density increased phytoplankton evenness. Recent climate warming is expected to affect phytoplankton biomass and diversity in marine ecosystems. Temperature can act directly on phytoplankton (e.g. rendering physiological processes) or indirectly due to changes in zooplankton grazing activity. We tested experimentally the impact of increased temperature on natural phytoplankton and zooplankton communities using indoor mesocosms and combined the results from different experimental years applying a meta-analytic approach. We divided our analysis into three bloom phases to define the strength of temperature and zooplankton impacts on phytoplankton in different stages of bloom development. Within the constraints of an experiment, our results suggest that increased temperature and zooplankton grazing have similar effects on phytoplankton diversity, which are most apparent in the post-bloom phase, when zooplankton abundances reach the highest values. Moreover, we observed changes in zooplankton composition in response to warming and initial conditions, which can additionally affect phytoplankton diversity, because changing feeding preferences of zooplankton can affect phytoplankton community structure. We conclude that phytoplankton diversity is indirectly affected by temperature in the post-bloom phase through changing zooplankton composition and grazing activities. Before and during the bloom, however, these effects seem to be overruled by temperature enhanced bottom-up processes such as phytoplankton nutrient uptake.

Description: The factors regulating species diversity have received increasing attention in the face of the global biodiversity loss, but are not well understood for unicellular organisms. We conducted in situ experiments in Kiel Fjord in order to analyze the response of microalgal diversity to colonization time and to artificial eutrophication. Diversity decreased throughout colonization time (maximum: 12 weeks), whereas species richness initially increased to about 25 species before it leveled off. The proposed unimodal time course of diversity during succession could not be detected for diversity or species richness. The rapid decrease of evenness indicated a greater importance of algal growth on the substrata compared to the arrival of new species. Artificial eutrophication led to an decrease of diversity, which could be correlated to the supply concentrations of the limiting nutrient: P in spring, N in summer and Si in the presence of high concentrations of N and P. The decrease was due to an increased dominance of few species (i.e. reduced evenness), whereas species richness was not or positively correlated to nutrient supply. Species richness was negatively correlated to evenness and diversity measures. Thus, species diversity indices are useful response variable to measure environmental effects on local periphyton communities

Description: In order to examine the effects of warming and diversity changes on primary productivity, we conducted a meta-analysis on six independent indoor mesocosm experiments with a natural plankton community from the Baltic Sea. Temperature effects on primary productivity changed with light intensity and zooplankton density and analysed pathways between temperature, diversity and productivity, elucidating direct and indirect effects of warming on primary productivity during the spring phytoplankton bloom. Our findings indicate that warming directly increased carbon specific primary productivity, which was more pronounced under low grazing pressure. On the other hand, primary productivity per unit water volume did not respond to increased temperature, because of a negative temperature effect on phytoplankton biomass. Moreover, primary productivity response to temperature changes depended on light limitation. Using path analysis, we tested whether temperature effects were direct or mediated by warming effects on phytoplankton diversity. Although phytoplankton species richness had a positive impact on both net primary productivity and carbon specific primary productivity – and evenness had a negative effect on net primary productivity – both richness and evenness were not affected by temperature. Thus, we suggest that diversity effects on primary productivity depended mainly on other factors than temperature like grazing, sinking or nutrient limitation, which themselves are temperature dependent. Highlights ► Impact of warming on primary productivity and diversity–productivity relationship. ► Meta-analysis on indoor mesocosm experiments with a natural plankton community. ► Temperature has a direct impact on specific productivity, not on net productivity. ► Species richness increases and evenness decreases net primary productivity. ► Temperature does not directly affect diversity–productivity relationship.

Description: Field experiments were conducted to investigate the effects of grazing and nutrient supply on sediment microflora in a freshwater habitat (Lake Erken, Sweden) and at the brackish Baltic Sea coast (Väddö, Sweden). The two sites were of similar productivity, but had contrasting herbivore composition. In a full-factorial experiment design, closed cages excluded macrozoobenthos (〉1 mm) from sediment patches, whereas open cages allowed grazer access. The cage design applied here proved to successfully prevent in- and epifauna to access the sediment in closed cages. In half of the treatments, nutrients were added to the water-column by a slow-release fertilizer. The experiments were seasonally replicated four times at Väddö and two times in Lake Erken. After 4–5 weeks, sediment cores were sampled and analyzed for chlorophyll, carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus. The benthic microalgae showed strong seasonal variation in biomass and internal nutrient content. At Väddö, neither grazing nor nutrients affected the algal biomass significantly, but significant grazer effects were detected on C:N:P ratios. In Lake Erken, grazer presence reduced algal biomass by ca. 50%, whereas nutrients were without effect on biomass or on nutrient content. Compared to results from hard substrata at the same sites, sediment microflora was less affected by nutrients and grazing. This may be due to the harsh physico-chemical environment on sediments, to low grazer density at the coastal site and to low availability of water column nutrients to sediment microalgae. In our experiments, sand-dwelling microphytobenthic communities represented a highly dynamic assemblage, which, however, is less structured by biotic interactions than epilithic periphyton

Description: Whereas the conservation and management of biodiversity has become a key issue in environmental sciences and policy in general, the conservation of marine biodiversity faces additional challenges such as the challenges of accessing field sites (e.g. polar, deep sea), knowledge gaps regarding biodiversity trends, high mobility of many organisms in fluid environments, and ecosystem-specific obstacles to stakeholder engagement and governance. This issue comprises contributions from a diverse international group of scientists in a benchmarking volume for a common research agenda on marine conservation. We begin by addressing information gaps on marine biodiversity trends through novel approaches and technologies, then linking such information to ecosystem functioning through a focus on traits. We then leverage the knowledge of these relationships to inform theory aiming at predicting the future composition and functioning of marine communities. Finally, we elucidate the linkages between marine ecosystems and human societies by examining economic, management and governance approaches that contribute to effective marine conservation in practice. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Integrative research perspectives on marine conservation’.

Description: Whereas the anthropogenic impact on marine biodiversity is undebated, the quantification and prediction of this change are not trivial. Simple traditional measures of biodiversity (e.g. richness, diversity indices) do not capture the magnitude and direction of changes in species or functional composition. In this paper, we apply recently developed methods for measuring biodiversity turnover to time-series data of four broad taxonomic groups from two coastal regions: the southern North Sea (Germany) and the South African coast. Both areas share geomorphological features and ecosystem types, allowing for a critical assessment of the most informative metrics of biodiversity change across organism groups. We found little evidence for directional trends in univariate metrics of diversity for either the effective number of taxa or the amount of richness change. However, turnover in composition was high (on average nearly 30% of identities when addressing presence or absence of species) and even higher when taking the relative dominance of species into account. This turnover accumulated over time at similar rates across regions and organism groups. We conclude that biodiversity metrics responsive to turnover provide a more accurate reflection of community change relative to conventional metrics (absolute richness or relative abundance) and are spatially broadly applicable. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Integrative research perspectives on marine conservation’.

Description: The relationship between biodiversity and ecosystem functioning (BEF) is a topic of considerable interest to scientists and managers because a better understanding of its underlying mechanisms may help us mitigate the consequences of biodiversity loss on ecosystems. Our current knowledge of BEF relies heavily on theoretical and experimental studies, typically conducted on a narrow range of spatio-temporal scales, environmental conditions, and trophic levels. Hence, whether a relationship holds in the natural environment is poorly understood, especially in exploited marine ecosystems. Using large-scale observations of marine fish communities, we applied a structural equation modelling framework to investigate the existence and significance of BEF relationships across northwestern European seas. We find that ecosystem functioning, here represented by spatial patterns in total fish biomass, is unrelated to species richness—the most commonly used diversity metric in BEF studies. Instead, community evenness, differences in species composition, and abiotic variables are significant drivers. In particular, we find that high fish biomass is associated with fish assemblages dominated by a few generalist species of a high trophic level, who are able to exploit both the benthic and pelagic energy pathway. Our study provides a better understanding of the mechanisms behind marine ecosystem functioning and allows for the integration of biodiversity into management considerations.