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Biogeochemistry of the Bay of Bengal: Physical, chemical and primary productivity characteristics of the central and western Bay of Bengal during summer monsoon 2001

DRS at CSIR-National Institute of Oceanography

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Title Biogeochemistry of the Bay of Bengal: Physical, chemical and primary productivity characteristics of the central and western Bay of Bengal during summer monsoon 2001
 
Creator Madhupratap, M.
Gauns, M.
Ramaiah, N.
PrasannaKumar, S.
Muraleedharan, P.M.
DeSousa, S.N.
Sardessai, S.
Muraleedharan, U.D.
 
Subject Physical Forcing
Stratification
Cold core eddy
Nutrients
Biological production
Chlorophyll
Phytoplankton
Diatom
Bay of Bengal
Mixed-Layer
 
Description Reliable data on biological characteristics from the Bay of Bengal are elusive. In this paper, we present results on physics, chemistry and biology simultaneously measured during the summer monsoon, 2001 from open ocean and coastal areas of the region. It was characterised by cold core eddies and thermocline oscillations. However, these were capped by prevalent low saline upper regime and prevented surfacing of nutrients. The river plume effects were evident from the low salinity values observed in the surface layers of the upper bay, but this did not bring-in significant amount of nutrients. The chlorophyll a concentrations (10-20 mg m-2) and primary productivity values (40-502 mg C m-2 d-1) were low and not up to Arabian Sea values for the same season. Diatoms dominated the phytoplankton community and consisted of more number of genera compared to the Arabian Sea. Large colonies of the tunicate, Pyrosoma, which occurred at the surface as well as mid-depths could have consumed a part of the phytoplankton population. These results, albeit limited, have implications on the biogeochemistry of the region.
We thank Department of Ocean Development, New Delhi, for the financial support. This work was carried out as a part of Bay of Bengal Process Studies programme.
 
Date 2006-03-23T07:44:38Z
2006-03-23T07:44:38Z
2003
 
Type Journal Article
 
Identifier Deep_sea Research II, vol.50 881-896
http://drs.nio.org/drs/handle/2264/26
 
Language en
 
Rights Copyright with Publisher.
 
Format 1045586 bytes
application/pdf
 
Publisher Elsevier