Fatty acid composition of lipid-rich myctophids and mackerel icefish (Champsocephalus gunnari) – Southern Ocean food-web implications
By Mary‐Anne Lea, P. Nichols, Gareth Wilson. Polar Biology, 2002
111 citations recorded by the source corpus.
Abstract. The lipid content, fatty acid composition and calorific value of seven species of mesopelagic deep-sea fish of the family Myctophidae and the mackerel icefish, Champsocephalus gunnari, important in the diet of Southern Ocean marine predators, are presented. Fish were sampled at the Kerguelen Plateau (KP) and Macquarie Ridge (MR) in the Indian and Pacific sectors of the Southern Ocean respectively, to examine geographic variation in lipid compositon. All species of myctophid from KP and Electrona antarctica from MR were high in lipid content (6–18% wet mass), particularly Gymnoscopelus nicholsi (18%) and E. antarctica (15%). The mackerel icefish, and G. fraseri and Protomyctophum tenisoni from MR were generally lower in lipid content (3–5%) and varied significantly in fatty acid composition from KP species. KP myctophids were high in calorific content (9.3 kJ g–1 wet mass) when compared with icefish (5.4 kJ g–1 wet mass) and other published values for prey items of marine predators such as squid (1.7–4.5 kJ g–1). KP myctophids were distinguished from each other and from C. gunnari and MR specimens by cluster and discriminant function analysis using six fatty acids (16:0, 18:1ω9, 20:1ω9, 22:1ω11, 20:5ω3, 22:6ω3). Findings presented here highlight trophic links between high-latitude fish and their prey and emphasise the importance of myctophids as a significant energy source for marine predators foraging in the Polar Frontal Zone.
Subfields: Ecology, Global and Planetary Change
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/7487f6981e52a434b92c9d87629361e254216866
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In Ecology
In Global and Planetary Change
- Y. Cherel
- P. Richard
- C. Guinet
- Camille Fontaine
- J. Labatc
- K. Bailey
- Henri Weimerskirch
- Daniel P. Costa
Citations in the corpus
- Climate regime shifts and reorganization of fish communities: the essential fatty acid limitation hypothesis (2006, result): “Almost all comparable data came from 4 studies of myctophids (Reinhardt & Van Vleet 1986, Seo et al. 1996, Saito & Murata 1998, Lea et al. 2002), so we limited our analysis to this family.”
- Isotopic niches and trophic levels of myctophid fishes and their predators in the Southern Ocean (2010, background): “Such a classification is not supported by myctophids from Kerguelen since most species are active migrants (Duhamel et al. 2000, 2005), which, depending on species, store either triacylglycerols or wax esters (Phleger et al. 1999; Lea et al. 2002b).”
- Southern elephant seal foraging success in relation to temperature and light conditions: insight into prey distribution (2014, background): “A similar effect of moonlight on diving behaviour has previously been observed in Galapagos fur seals Arctocephalus galapagoensis (Horning & Trillmich 1999) and northern fur seals Callorhinus ursinus (Lea et al. 2010).”
- A review on mesopelagic fishes belonging to family Myctophidae (2011, background): “…are high in proteins and mineral content, variably lower in lipids and uniformly low in carbohydrates (Neighbors and Nafpaktitis 1982; Lekshmy et al. 1983; Nair et al. 1983; FAO fisheries 1997; Phleger et al. 1999; Lea et al. 2002; Goode and Bean 1984), which indicates its nutritional importance.”