Distribuição espaço-temporal de espécies da comunidade Zooplanctônica na plataforma continental amazônica.

Abstract

Biodiversity and the structure of the zooplankton community on the Brazilian Amazon Continental Shelf were evaluated based on 32 literatures (24 white literatures and 8 gray literatures) relating to the period between 1963 and 2023. In these literatures, 458 zooplankton taxa were recorded. With emphasis on Arthropods (328 taxa) and Cnidaria (73 taxa). Even with few scientific productions, it can be concluded that the zooplankton community presents a high diversity of species of Copepods, Malacostracas and Hydrozoa and their distributions are mainly influenced by the Amazon plume and reef areas. Zooplankton taxa have a wide distribution throughout the Platform, among which the diversity is different for neritic (smaller) and oceanic (larger) waters. Based on this review and the sampling carried out in this study, the analysis of the structure of the zooplankton community on the Amazon Continental Shelf is characteristic of coastal environments under the influence of river plumes, being decisive in the distribution of these organisms, of which 91 taxa were recorded, the phylum Arthropoda quantitatively dominated the local zooplankton with 70%. Copepods outnumbered other zooplankton taxa with 45 (49.5%), increasing diversity towards stations further away from the coast. Brachyura (Zoea and Megalopa) was the taxa with the highest frequency of occurrence (95.8%), as it was present in 47 of the 48 samples. Evidencing that there is variation in the composition of mesozooplankton species due to seasonal variation in this environment. Therefore, this study reinforces the importance of maintaining seasonal series and surveying biodiversity to understand the dynamics of the zooplankton community in highly complex environments, such as the Amazon Continental Shelf.