Nitrogen regeneration by the subtropical marine copepod Eucalanus pileatus
- 30 June 1982
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Oxford University Press (OUP) in Journal of Plankton Research
- Vol. 4 (3) , 725-734
- https://doi.org/10.1093/plankt/4.3.725
Abstract
Ammonium release rates by individual marine copepods ( Eucalanus pileatus ) were examined kinetically over successive 10-min intervals after the animals were exposed to three concentrations of the diatom Thalassiosira fluviatilis as food. Food concentrations spanned those expected in the natural environment. “Well-fed” (3 mm 3T. fluviatilis l −1 ) copepods released ammonium significantly (p 100% of their N ingestion rates over the previous 18–22 h. Long-term (4–6 h) kinetic excretion experiments with “well-fed” animals indicated that, on average, release rates decreased with time after food removal, but patterns varied among individual copepods. In addition to ammonium release, o-phthalaldehyde reactive amino acid nitrogen was occasionally released by E. pileatus in large “spurt events” lasting from 20 to 60 min.This publication has 0 references indexed in Scilit: