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High Arctic meiofaunal distribution, standing stock, sediment chemistry and benthic respiratory activity (determined by sediment oxygen consumption using a shipboard technique) were studied in summer 1980 on the NE Svalbard shelf (northern Barents Sea) and along a transect into the Nansen Basin, over a depth range of 240–3920 m. Particulate sediment proteins, carbohydrates and adenylates were measured as additional measures of benthic biomass. To estimate the sedimentation potential of primary organic matter, sediment bound chloroplastic pigments (chlorophylls, pheopigments) were assayed. Pigment concentrations were found comparable to values in sediments from the boreal and temperate N-Atlantic. Meiofauna, which was abundant on the shelf, decreased in numbers and biomasses with increasing depth, as did sediment proteins, carbohydrates, adenylates and sediment oxygen consumption. Meiofaunal abundances and biomasses within the Nansen Basin were comparable with those observed in abyssal sediments of the North Atlantic. Nematodes clearly dominated in metazoan meiofauna. Protozoans were abundant in shelf sediments. Probably in response to the sedimentation of the plankton bloom, meiofauna abundance and biomass as well as sediment proteins, carbohydrates and adenylates were significantly correlated to the amount of sediment bound chloroplastic pigments, stressing the importance of food quantity to determine benthic stocks. Ninety-four percent of the variance in sediment oxygen consumption were caused by chloroplastic pigments. Benthic respiration, calculated per unit biomass, was 3–10 times lower than in the East Atlantic, suggesting low turnover rates in combination with a high standing stocks for the high Arctic benthos.

Sea ice microbial communities (SIMCO) grow luxuriantly within several microhabitats of sea ice, indicating that the microorganisms comprising these communities are well adapted to the physicochemical gradients which characterize sea ice. We used SIMCO obtained from the bottom of congelation ice in McMurdo Sound, Antarctica, to test the hypothesis that low temperature limits microbial productivity in polar oceans and also to investigate the effect of salinity on rates of autotrophic and heterotrophic metablism. Substantial rates of carbon fixation, incorporation of thymidine, and uptake of glutamate occurred at the in situ temperatures of-1.9°C, with maximum rates at temperatures considerably warmer but below 15°C. Microalgae and bacteria of SIMCO are thus indicated to be psychrophiles. The relative rates of autotrophic and heterotrophic microbial growth (based on rates of fixation of 14CO2 by microalgae and incorporation of 3H-thymidine by bacteria, respectively) were similar and overlapped from 4° and 7°C. These data suggest that a recent hypothesis proposing the uncoupling of primary production and bacterial production in cold water, due to differential growth of phytoplankton and bacterioplankton at low temperatures, is refuted with respect to SIMCO. Maximum rates of carbon fixation by autotrophs of SIMCO occurred at salinities which characterized the ice from which the SIMCO were collected. In contrast, heterotrophs of SIMCO exhibited a more stenohaline response to variable salinity, with maximum incorporation of thymidine and uridine from 20‰ to 30‰. Adaptations by autotrophs and heterotrophs of SIMCO that permit substantial metabolism and growth at very low temperatures and variable salinities are significant when considering production and trophodynamics in polar oceans. Actively growing microorganisms in these unique communities contribute to overall production in polar oceans, provide carbon for food webs associated with sea ice, and upon release from melting ice may contribute to microbial blooms in marginal ice edge zones, which in turn support cryopelagic food webs.