Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 18, 2026

A Low-Cost Method of Measuring the In Situ Primary Productivity of Periphyton Communities of Lentic Waters
Published on: December 16, 2022
Relationship between bacterioplankton richness, respiration, and production in the Southern North Sea
Thomas Reinthaler1, Christian Winter, Gerhard J Herndl
1Department of Biological Oceanography, Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ), P.O. Box 59, 1790 AB Den Burg, Texel, The Netherlands. thomas.reinthaler@nioz.nl
Abstract:
We investigated the relationship between bacterioplankton production (BP), respiration (BR), and community composition measured by terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism in the southern North Sea over a seasonal cycle. Major changes in bacterioplankton richness were apparent from April to December. While cell-specific BP decreased highly significantly with increasing bacterioplankton richness, cell-specific BR was found to be variable along the richness gradient, suggesting that bacterioplankton respiration is rather independent from shifts in the bacterial community composition. As a consequence, the bacterial growth efficiency [BGE = BP/(BP + BR)] was negatively related to bacterioplankton richness, explaining approximately 43% of the variation in BGE. Our results indicate that despite the observed shifts in the community composition, the main function of the bacterioplankton, the remineralization of dissolved organic carbon to CO(2), is rather stable.
Related Concept Videos
Marine Microbial Ecology
Deep Sea Microbial Ecology
Anoxygenic Phototrophic Bacteria
Freshwater Microbial Ecology
Microbial Interactions: Competition
Primary Production

