Northern Gulf of Mexico Continental Slope Habitats and Benthic Ecology Study

摘要

The Deep Gulf of Mexico Benthos (DGoMB) project was initiated for the Minerals Management Service of the U.S. Department of the Interior in 1999 to investigate the structure and function of the biota associated with the sea floor in the deep water of the northern Gulf of Mexico. The purpose of the study has been to determine how living resources inhabiting deepwater habitats might be impacted by oil and gas exploration and exploitation. The strategy of the field work was to survey a broad region during an initial stage from which community structure could be determined, accompanied by extensive sampling of physico-chemical variables within both the water column and the sediments of the sea floor. Eight hypotheses were tested on the basis of this survey, all related to how the environmental variables control or affect community biomass, standing stocks, diversity and recurrent assemblages of species. The variables tested were depth, location within small (5 to 15 km diameter) basins, canyons, geographic location in the east vs. western half of the northern gulf basin, location below steep escarpments, proximity to high vs. low surface water productivity, and association with or next to methane seeps.