• Journal of the Korean Society of Marine Environment & Safety
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• v.30 no.5
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• pp.396-406
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• 2024

We carried out a field survey to analyze the spatial distributions of phytoplankton communities at 15 stations in the Yellow Sea in 2019. Diatoms exhibited a high appearance rate in winter and spring, whereas small flagellates(<20 ㎛) showed a high appearance rate in summer and autumn. This change in the phytoplankton-community structure may be ascribed to low nutrient concentrations in the area, especially of phosphate, which was below the detection limit, seriously hampering the phytoplankton growth. The composition ratio of picophytoplankton was high in the surface mixed layer in summer and autumn when the water columns exhibited strong stratification. Redundancy analysis revealed strong negative correlations between nutrients (NO₃^-, PO₄^3-) and water depth. In conclusion, the reduction in nutrients in the surface mixed layer owing to the strengthening of stratification in summer and autumn creates favorable conditions for the growth of relatively small phytoplankton with low nutrient requirements, leading to a shift towards a smaller phytoplankton-community structure.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
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• v.40 no.1
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• pp.54-69
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• 2022

We conducted a field survey from 2018 to 2020 to analyze the spatial distribution of phytoplankton communities at 13 stations in the East Sea. The diatom Chaetoceros curvisetus appeared as the dominant species in winter, and small flagellates less than 20 ㎛ prevailed in all seasons except winter. The seasonal average range of the micro (>20 ㎛), nano (20 ㎛≥Chl-a>3 ㎛), and picophytoplankton (≤3 ㎛) was 20.6-26.2%, 27.1-35.9%, and 40.8-49.0%, respectively. The composition ratio of nano and picophytoplankton was high at the surface mixed layer from spring to autumn when the water columns were strongly stratified. Especially, the stability of the water mass was increased when the summer surface water temperature was higher than that of the previous year. As a result, the nutrient inflow from the lower layer to the surface was reduced as the ocean stratification layer was strengthened. Therefore, the composition ratio of nano and picophytoplankton was the highest at 77.9% at the surface mixed layer. In conclusion, the structure of the phytoplankton community in the East Sea has been miniaturized, which is expected to form a complex microbial food web structure and lower the carbon transfer rate to the upper consumer stage.

• Korean Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.52 no.3
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• pp.231-244
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• 2019

Zooplankton is essential biological assemblage in understanding the structure and function of aquatic ecosystems, since it plays as a linkage between primary producers and higher trophic level organisms such as fish. Although zooplankton has planktonic characteristics, the sampling and treatment methods for its community analyses are more complicated and variable compared with phytoplankton due to its high diversity in body size and species-specific depth selection behaviors. In the present paper, we reviewed representative classical methods for field sampling and treatments of freshwater zooplankton in relation with quantification of its community structure, and suggested appropriate methods depending on various research objectives.