M3.1 Continental and island slopes

M3. Deep sea floors biome

M3

Profile summary

Full profile at https://global-ecosystems.org/explore/groups/M3.1

Brief description

These lightless slopes of sand, mud and rocky outrops run down from the shallower shelf break to the very deep abyssal basins. Nutrients falling from upper ocean layers and delivered by currents from the shelf support diverse communities of microbial decomposers, detritivores like crabs and demersal fish, and their predators, but sessile animals are rare and algae are absent. Biomass is relatively low and peaks at mid-slope, diminishing with depth as food and temperature decrease and bathymetric pressure increases.

Key features

Large sedimentary, aphotic,  and heterotrophic slopes where depth gradients result in a bathymetric faunal zonation of high taxonomic diverstiy..

Overview of distribution

Continental slopes from shelf break (~250 m) to abyssal basins (4000 m).

Map description

Major occurrences of continental and island slopes was based on the ‘slope’ geomorphic unit of Harris et al. (2014b). Occurrences were converted to 30 arc second spatial resolution..

Map code and version: M3.1.web.orig v1.0. DOI

Version history

Profile versions

  • v2.1 (2022-04-06): E Ramirez-Llodra; UC Fernandez-Arcaya; IG Priede; DA Keith.1
  • v2.01 (NA): NA.
  • v2.0 (2020-05-28): E Ramirez-Llodra; UC Fernandez-Arcaya; IG Priede; DA Keith.
  • v1.0 (2020-01-20): E Ramirez-Llodra; UC Fernandez-Arcaya; DA Keith.

Available maps

Read more details about the current map versions here.

  • Indicative Map (code: M3.1.IM.orig, version v1.0)
  • Web navigation (code: M3.1.web.orig, version v1.0)

Read more details about older or alternative versions of maps for this functional group.

  • Web navigation: in preparation (code: M3.1.WM.nwx, version v1.0)

References

Main references

References used in the different versions of the profiles.

  • Menot L, Sibuet M, Carney RS, Levin LA, Rowe GT, Billett DSM et al. (2010) New perceptions of continental margin biodiversity Life in the world’s oceans: diversity, distribution and abundance Chapter 5, pp 79-101. Blackwell, Chichester. DOI:10.1002/9781444325508.ch5

Map references

References used in the different versions of the maps (current and discarded).

  • Harris PT, Macmillan-Lawler M, Rupp J, Baker EK (2014) Geomorphology of the oceans. Marine Geology 352: 4-24. 10.1016/j.margeo.2014.01.011

Footnotes

  1. This is the current version available at official site.↩︎