Functional group diversity is key to Southern Ocean benthic carbon pathways

Area of Science:

• Marine Ecology
• Oceanography
• Biogeochemistry

Background:

• High latitude benthos play a crucial role in ocean carbon storage, impacting regional warming.
• Understanding benthic ecosystem services is challenging due to complex biodiversity and geography.
• South Georgia provides a well-studied model for investigating benthic biology.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess the critical role of functional groups in benthic carbon accumulation, immobilization, and burial.
• To determine if functional groups simplify the study of benthic biomass and carbon pathways.
• To investigate the influence of functional group composition on carbon sequestration.

Main Methods:

• Reclassified morphotype and carbon mass data into 13 functional groups across 32 sites.
• Analyzed the influence of functional group composition on carbon accumulation, immobilization, and sequestration.
• Examined relationships between functional groups, habitat types, and carbon storage.

Main Results:

• Functional groups exhibited high diversity within and between sites and habitats.
• Carbon accumulation and immobilization increased with the number of functional groups and presence of hard substrata.
• Carbon burial rate was enhanced by mixed hard and soft substrata.

Conclusions:

• Functional groups serve as effective surrogates for taxonomic composition in habitat categorization.
• Functional groups simplify marine carbon storage investigations by reducing time and expertise needed.
• Seabed boulder fields are carbon hotspots; interfaces between boulder fields and sediments are key for burial and sequestration.