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Foraging in the Darkness of the Southern Ocean: Influence of Bioluminescence on a Deep Diving Predator
How non-echolocating deep diving marine predators locate their prey while foraging remains mostly unknown. Female southern elephant seals (SES) (Mirounga leonina) have vision adapted to low intensity light with a peak sensitivity at 485 nm. This matches the wavelength of bioluminescence produced by...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Public Library of Science
2012
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3430693/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22952706 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0043565 |
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author | Vacquié-Garcia, Jade Royer, François Dragon, Anne-Cécile Viviant, Morgane Bailleul, Frédéric Guinet, Christophe |
author_facet | Vacquié-Garcia, Jade Royer, François Dragon, Anne-Cécile Viviant, Morgane Bailleul, Frédéric Guinet, Christophe |
author_sort | Vacquié-Garcia, Jade |
collection | PubMed |
description | How non-echolocating deep diving marine predators locate their prey while foraging remains mostly unknown. Female southern elephant seals (SES) (Mirounga leonina) have vision adapted to low intensity light with a peak sensitivity at 485 nm. This matches the wavelength of bioluminescence produced by a large range of marine organisms including myctophid fish, SES’s main prey. In this study, we investigated whether bioluminescence provides an accurate estimate of prey occurrence for SES. To do so, four SES were satellite-tracked during their post-breeding foraging trip and were equipped with Time-Depth-Recorders that also recorded light levels every two seconds. A total of 3386 dives were processed through a light-treatment model that detected light events higher than ambient level, i.e. bioluminescence events. The number of bioluminescence events was related to an index of foraging intensity for SES dives deep enough to avoid the influence of natural ambient light. The occurrence of bioluminescence was found to be negatively related to depth both at night and day. Foraging intensity was also positively related to bioluminescence both during day and night. This result suggests that bioluminescence likely provides SES with valuable indications of prey occurrence and might be a key element in predator-prey interactions in deep-dark marine environments. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-3430693 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2012 |
publisher | Public Library of Science |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-34306932012-09-05 Foraging in the Darkness of the Southern Ocean: Influence of Bioluminescence on a Deep Diving Predator Vacquié-Garcia, Jade Royer, François Dragon, Anne-Cécile Viviant, Morgane Bailleul, Frédéric Guinet, Christophe PLoS One Research Article How non-echolocating deep diving marine predators locate their prey while foraging remains mostly unknown. Female southern elephant seals (SES) (Mirounga leonina) have vision adapted to low intensity light with a peak sensitivity at 485 nm. This matches the wavelength of bioluminescence produced by a large range of marine organisms including myctophid fish, SES’s main prey. In this study, we investigated whether bioluminescence provides an accurate estimate of prey occurrence for SES. To do so, four SES were satellite-tracked during their post-breeding foraging trip and were equipped with Time-Depth-Recorders that also recorded light levels every two seconds. A total of 3386 dives were processed through a light-treatment model that detected light events higher than ambient level, i.e. bioluminescence events. The number of bioluminescence events was related to an index of foraging intensity for SES dives deep enough to avoid the influence of natural ambient light. The occurrence of bioluminescence was found to be negatively related to depth both at night and day. Foraging intensity was also positively related to bioluminescence both during day and night. This result suggests that bioluminescence likely provides SES with valuable indications of prey occurrence and might be a key element in predator-prey interactions in deep-dark marine environments. Public Library of Science 2012-08-29 /pmc/articles/PMC3430693/ /pubmed/22952706 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0043565 Text en © 2012 Vacquié-Garcia et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Vacquié-Garcia, Jade Royer, François Dragon, Anne-Cécile Viviant, Morgane Bailleul, Frédéric Guinet, Christophe Foraging in the Darkness of the Southern Ocean: Influence of Bioluminescence on a Deep Diving Predator |
title | Foraging in the Darkness of the Southern Ocean: Influence of Bioluminescence on a Deep Diving Predator |
title_full | Foraging in the Darkness of the Southern Ocean: Influence of Bioluminescence on a Deep Diving Predator |
title_fullStr | Foraging in the Darkness of the Southern Ocean: Influence of Bioluminescence on a Deep Diving Predator |
title_full_unstemmed | Foraging in the Darkness of the Southern Ocean: Influence of Bioluminescence on a Deep Diving Predator |
title_short | Foraging in the Darkness of the Southern Ocean: Influence of Bioluminescence on a Deep Diving Predator |
title_sort | foraging in the darkness of the southern ocean: influence of bioluminescence on a deep diving predator |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3430693/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22952706 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0043565 |
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