A database of marine phytoplankton abundance, biomass and species composition in Australian waters

Claire H. Davies*, Alex Coughlan, Gustaaf Hallegraeff, Penelope Ajani, Linda Armbrecht, Natalia Atkins, Prudence Bonham, Steve Brett, Richard Brinkman, Michele Burford, Lesley Clementson, Peter Coad, Frank Coman, Diana Davies, Jocelyn Dela-Cruz, Michelle Devlin, Steven Edgar, Ruth Eriksen, Miles Furnas, Christel HasslerDavid Hill, Michael Holmes, Tim Ingleton, Ian Jameson, Sophie C. Leterme, Christian Lønborg, James McLaughlin, Felicity McEnnulty, A. David McKinnon, Margaret Miller, Shauna Murray, Sasi Nayar, Renee Patten, Tim Pritchard, Roger Proctor, Diane Purcell-Meyerink, Eric Raes, David Rissik, Jason Ruszczyk, Anita Slotwinski, Kerrie M. Swadling, Katherine Tattersall, Peter Thompson, Paul Thomson, Mark Tonks, Thomas W. Trull, Julian Uribe-Palomino, Anya M. Waite, Rouna Yauwenas, Anthony Zammit, Anthony J. Richardson

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

33 Citations (Scopus)
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Abstract

There have been many individual phytoplankton datasets collected across Australia since the mid 1900s, but most are unavailable to the research community. We have searched archives, contacted researchers, and scanned the primary and grey literature to collate 3,621,847 records of marine phytoplankton species from Australian waters from 1844 to the present. Many of these are small datasets collected for local questions, but combined they provide over 170 years of data on phytoplankton communities in Australian waters. Units and taxonomy have been standardised, obviously erroneous data removed, and all metadata included. We have lodged this dataset with the Australian Ocean Data Network (http://portal.aodn.org.au/) allowing public access. The Australian Phytoplankton Database will be invaluable for global change studies, as it allows analysis of ecological indicators of climate change and eutrophication (e.g., changes in distribution; diatom:dinoflagellate ratios). In addition, the standardised conversion of abundance records to biomass provides modellers with quantifiable data to initialise and validate ecosystem models of lower marine trophic levels.

Original languageEnglish
Article number160043
Pages (from-to)1-9
Number of pages9
JournalScientific Data
Volume3
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 21 Jun 2016

Bibliographical note

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