Benthic macroalgae

The purpose of this chapter is to review the role of DMSP and related compounds in marine algae, with an emphasis on benthic macroalgae. The first section of this review will focus on DMSP. The second section will focus on its cleavage and the roles of its cleavage or breakdown products DMS, acrylate, and acrylic acid... 

Leal, M.C.F., M.T. Vasconcelos, I. Sousa-Pinto, and J.P.S. Cabral. 1997. Biomonitoring with benthic macroalgae and direct assay of heavy metals in seawater of the Oporto coast (Northwest Portugal). Mar. Pollut. Bull. 34 1006-1015. 

Benthic macroalgae and microphytobenthos are important sources of primary production in estuaries and have significant effects on the seagrass, tidal flat, and intertidal marsh habitats. 

France et al. (1998) surveyed benthic macroalgae in the reef environments of Puerto Rico, comparing them to macroalgal samples from the northeast coast of the U.S. and freshwater environments, finding further support for the notion that N2 fixation is associated with macroalgal-cyanobacterial consortia on the reef... 

Holmquist, J. G. (1994). Benthic macroalgae as a dispersal mechanism for fauna Influence of a marine tumbleweed. J. Exp. Mar. Biol. Ecol. 180, 235-251. 

Nielsen, R., Kristiansen, A., Mathiesen, L., Mathiesen, H., 1995. Distributional index of the benthic macroalgae of the Baltic Sea area. Acta Botanica Fennica, 155, 1-51. 

Wikstrom et al. 2006). We need similar studies to assess the impact of chemically defended macroalgae on the structure and dynamics of tropical marine benthic communities. 

Both known species of Ostreopsis, 0. ovata and 0. siamensis, are known to exhibit some toxic activity (5l). Like toxicus, they are also benthic and common in macroalgae, but they also occur on sand in the vicinity. Although they co-occurred with it periodically, they were often abundant when it was not, (49). They are also known from both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans and are probably circum-tropical. 

Herbivory in benthic marine systems is intense. For example, on coral reefs, herbivores can remove almost 100% of the biomass produced daily by marine macroalgae, whereas in the most intensely grazed terrestrial systems — African grasslands — herbivores only consume about 66% of the above-ground plant biomass.9-21-102 While terrestrial plants produce subterranean structures such as roots, bulbs, and tubers that are generally inaccessible to most animals, most marine algae do not... 

Littler, M. M. and Littler, D. S., The evolution of thallus form and survival strategies in benthic marine macroalgae field and laboratory tests of a functional form model, Am. Nat., 116, 25, 1980. 

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