Dalhousie University

Purpose

This project focuses on the impact of temperature increase on the marine phytoplankton and their associated communities. The effects of Sea Surface Temperature (SST) increase and Marine Heat Wave (MHW) events on the plankton communities will be experimentally studied and compared to a detailed time-series of phytoplankton and microbial community composition acquired from environmental DNA (eDNA) since 2014. A novel focus to time-series observations will provide detailed knowledge of the key species (ranging from microbe to metazoans) associated with dominant phytoplankton species within the NWA ecosystem. The potential effect of MHW on the natural communities of phytoplankton of a coastal ecosystem in manipulative incubations of water samples at ambient and elevated temperatures. Novel phytoplankton species will be isolated and cultivated in the laboratory and used for manipulative temperature shift experiments.