Gulf of Alaska | Lower Trophic Levels MASTER’S POSTER PRESENTATION Using in situ imaging to describe zooplankton communities in the Northern Gulf of Alaska Presenter: Hannah Kepner , hekepner@alaska.edu The Northern Gulf of Alaska (NGA) marine environment is highly dynamic, which makes it challenging to thoroughly describe patterns in its zooplankton communities. Zooplankton abundances and distributions can be poorly resolved by net tows due to species patchiness and the damage they inflict to gelatinous organisms. High spatial resolution data from plankton nets is also severly limited by time and effort constraints on sample collection and laboratory taxonomic analysis. To resolve these challenges, we have begun deploying an “ In situ Ichthyoplankton Imaging System Deep-Focus Particle Imager” (ISIIS-DPI) in the NGA. ISIIS-DPI is a Remotely Operated Towed Vehicle (ROTV) with a wide array of in situ instrumentation, and an imaging system consisting of 3 line-scan cameras that image ~250 liters/second and conserve the scale (size) of particles and plankton. In our initial deployments, preliminary data shows that zooplankton are highly aggregated in both the horizontal and vertical dimensions of the epipelagic zone, much more than we expected based on net collection data. Moving forward, the datasets generated with the ISIIS-DPI will allow us to uncover fine-scale patterns in the spatial resolution of zooplankton abundance and distribution in near real-time. By clarifying the biophysical drivers that shape these patterns, we will resolve gaps in current knowledge to improve our understanding of plankton communities within the NGA.
Alaska Marine Science Symposium 2023 130
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