Seasonal deposition of phytodetritus to the deep-sea floor

Synopsis Evidence has accumulated over the past twenty years to suggest that the deep-sea environment is not as constant as was at one time thought, but exhibits temporal variations related to the seasonally in the overlying surface waters. Recent results from deep-moored sediment traps suggest that this coupling is mediated through the sedimentation of organic material, while observations in the Porcupine Seabight indicate that in this region, at least, there is a major and rapid seasonal deposition of aggregated phytodetritus to the sea-floor at slope and abyssal depths. This paper summarises the results of the Porcupine Seabight studies over the past five years or so, using time-lapse sea-bed photography and microscopic, microbiological and chemical analyses of samples of phytodetritus and of the underlying sediment. The data are to some extent equivocal, but they suggest that the seasonal deposition is a regular and dramatic phenomenon and that the material undergoes relatively little degradation during its passage through the water column. The mechanisms leading to the aggregation of the phytodetritus have not been identified, and it is not yet known whether the phenomenon is geographically widespread nor whether it is of significance to the deep-living mid-water and benthic communities.