Quantifying Antarctic marine biodiversity and richness using

SCAR-MarBIN

Huw Griffiths Bruno Danis and Andrew Clarke

Overview• Methodology

•Taxonomic coverage

•Area of interest

•Geographic distribution

•Phylum level species and sampling distributions

•Major groups level species and sampling distributions

•Depth distributions

•Conclusions

•Polar Synthesis Macroscope Update

•Plea for help!

Methodology

• Cleaning of whole ANTOBIS database

• Depth data added to all benthic records using ETOPO2 data

• Species counts vs number of stations maps for each major phylum (nematoda, mollusca, cnidaria, echinodermata, chordata, arthropoda & annelida)

• Species counts vs number of stations maps for major groups: (fish, birds and mammals, pelagic & benthic)

• Depth analysis. Numbers of benthic stations & species by depth

SCAR-MarBIN & RAMS

0

10

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% Species

% Records

Areas of interest

SCAR-MarBIN data distribution

All Species

Nematoda

Annelida

Cnidaria

Echinodermata

Mollusca

Chordata

Arthropoda

Summary

• Spatial & taxonomic coverage varies greatly between groups

• Major taxa “missing”: Sponges, Isopods, Pycnogonids, Bryozoans, Decapoda, Crinoidea & Brachiopoda

• Under-sampled & un-sampled areas: W. Weddell Sea, Amundsen Sea, deep sea

Benthic Species

Planktonic Species

Birds & Mammals

Fish

Summary• Bias towards shallow, presence of bases and ship routes

• Overall dataset: bird & mammal observations and tags dominate the station analysis

• Benthic data drives overall pattern of species richness

• Concurrence between benthic data hotspots and station presence

• Fish and CPR observation data drive pelagic data patterns

Depth Analysis

Conclusions• Sampling bias's drive many of the patterns• Depth bias, massive under sampling in deep water for

benthos• Well sampled areas and groups are suitable for

further analysis and predictions………..

Macroscope update

• 251 “Bi-polar” species- increased Arctic species list

• Physical classification of Ice-Oceans (benthic and pelagic)

• First comprehensive Arctic species list• Diversity modelling

Temperature Depth & Rugosity Distance FromShallows

Benthic classification

Pelagic classification

Plea for help……..

• New “bi-polar” species coordinator!• New sponge dataset!• More datasets needed for modelling and

phylogenetic analysis