Commentary: Threatened by mining, polymetallic nodules are required to preserve abyssal epifauna

摘要

Every so often new species, habitats and interspecies relations are discovered in the deep sea which pose a fundamental challenge to the way in which the oceans are governed.The recent discovery of an abundant and diverse sessile epifauna on manganese nodules may be precisely such a case.A recent paper by Vanreusel et al.(2016) in Nature Scienti?c Reports presents the results of a research cruise conducted in 2015, in areas being considered for polymetallic nodule mining in the Clipperton-Clarion Fracture Zone of the central eastern Paci?c Ocean.The research showed that “epifaunal densities are more than two times higher at dense nodule coverage...and that taxa such as alcyonacean and antipatharian corals are virtually absent from nodule-free areas.Furthermore, surveys conducted along tracks from trawling or experimental mining simulations up to 37 years old, suggest that the removal of epifauna is almost complete and that its full recovery is slow” (Vanreusel et al., 2016, p.6).