Project information
Project aim
Epishelf lakes are freshwater lakes situated adjacent to ice-shelves. Their basins continue beneath the ice-shelf, thereby providing hydraulic connection to the sea. Recent work (Laybourn-Parry et al., 2001) on Beaver Lake (Eastern Antarctica) has demonstrated that epishelf lakes are ecosystems on the edge of existence, and that their populations of largely microbial organisms live under permanent stress. It has been suggested that epishelf lakes are old and have acted as refugia for Antarctic organisms. Thus one might expect to find that a significant component of their biota has a circum-polar distribution. Our approach has two main aims, firstly to examine the biodiversity of the microbial plankton using molecular techniques, and secondly to produce models of carbon cycling in the water column for the summer, thereby elucidating the functional dynamics of the plankton community.