M3.2 Submarine canyons

M3. Deep sea floors biome

M3

Profile summary

Full profile at https://global-ecosystems.org/explore/groups/M3.2

Brief description

Submarine canyons house some of the most productive and diverse deep sea ecosystems. They can disrupt local currents and channel nutrients from the continental shelves into ocean basins. The flux of nutrients promotes productivity, with high densities of burrowing organisms can live in muddy or sandy bottoms, and filter feeders like cold-water corals inhabit the rocky walls. Canyons provide important shelter, spawning and nursery areas and feeding grounds for many organisms including non-resident megafauna like whales.

Key features

Dinamics and heterogenous geomorphic features,  supporting highly diverse heterotrophic communities through enhaced transport of energy from the continents to the deep sea..

Overview of distribution

Submarine canyons incising continental margins globally.

Map description

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

Map code and version: M3.2.web.orig v1.0. DOI

Version history

Profile versions

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

Available maps

Read more details about the current map versions here.

  • Indicative Map (code: M3.2.IM.orig, version v1.0)
  • Web navigation (code: M3.2.web.orig, version v1.0)

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

  • Web navigation: in preparation (code: M3.2.WM.nwx, version v1.0)

References

Main references

References used in the different versions of the profiles.

  • Fernandez-Arcaya U, Ramirez-Llodra E, Aguzzi J, Allcock AL, Davies JS, Dissanayake A, Harris P, Howell K, Huvenne VA, Macmillan-Lawler M, Martín J (2017) Ecological role of submarine canyons and need for canyon conservation: a review Frontiers in Marine Science 4: 5

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.↩︎