• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.441-453
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• 2017

This paper described the spatio-temporal distributions in the phytoplankton community, such as species composition, standing crops, and dominant species, from July 2012 to April 2013 in the Coastal Waters of Central South Sea (CWoCSS) of Korea. A total of 87 species of phytoplankton belonging to 52 genera were identified. In particular, diatoms and phytoflagellates comprised more than 62.1% and 37.9% of the total species, respectively. The phytoplankton cell density fluctuated with an annual mean of $7.9{\times}10^4cells{\cdot}L^{-1}$ between the lowest value of $1.0{\times}10^3cells{\cdot}L^{-1}$ in spring and the highest value of $4.5{\times}10^5cells{\cdot}L^{-1}$ in winter. The seasonal succession of the dominant species were Chaetoceros curvisetus, Ch. debilis in summer, Eucampia zodiacus in autumn, E. zodiacus, Thalassiosira curviseriata in winter and Skeletonema costatum -ls (like species), Leptocylindrus danicus in spring. According to principal component analysis, the phytoplankton community of the CWoCSS was characterized by the mixing rate between the freshwater inflow from Somjin River and the seawater of the South Sea, Korea.