DETERMINATION OF THE RATE AND EFFICIENCY OF NITROGEN TRANSFER FROM PHYTOPLANKTON TO ZOOPLANKTON USING NITROGEN-IS AS A TRACER

摘要

The rate of assimilated nitrogen transfer from phytoplankton to zooplankton was measured under field conditions for natural mixed zooplankton populations using a nitrogen-15 tracer technique. The variability in rates, which ranged from 0.261 to 1.792 gram-atoms of phytoplankton nitrogen/gram-atoms of zooplankton nitrogen/24 hours, are thought to reflect a variability in the age frequency distribution of the zooplankton population.nThe data were used to calculate assimilation efficiencies which were found to range from 25.4 to 66.1%. The efficiency of 66.1% was taken to be the most accurate measurement for reasons discussed in the text.