Marine protected areas (MPAs) as management tools to conserve seamount ecosystems

摘要

Understanding of the diversity and complexity of deep-sea ecosystems has developed rather slowly, principally because of the substantial difficulties in conducting research in such an extreme and inaccessible environment. Nevertheless, what was for along time assumed to be a somewhat uniform, sparsely populated and constant environment is now increasingly recognized as a dynamic, biologically diverse and integral component of the biosphere. Initial reports of higher than expected species richness from the late 1960s have been confirmed only relatively recently by more extensive and quantitative surveys of deep-sea communities (Soetart, Haip and Vincx. 1991, Etter and Grassle 1992, Grassle and Maciolek 1992, Rex et al. 1993).