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Hydrobiological Journal

ISSN for PRINT: 0018-8166

Institutional price:	$1994.00
Issues per year:	6

Best Paper Award Selection - Editorial Board Site

2007, Volume43

112 pages

Issue price - $399.00

The Change in the Length of Colonies of the Planktonic Diatom Aulacoseira baicalensis in Various Stages of the Annual Cycle in Lake Baikal

Ye. D. Bedoshvili
Limnological Institute of the Siberian Branch of RAS, Irkutsk, Russia

N. A. Bondarenko
Limnological Institute, Siberian Department of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 3, Ulan-Batorskaya St., 664033 Irkutsk, Russia

M. V. Sakirko
Limnological Institute of the Siberian Branch of RAS, Irkutsk, Russia

I. V. Khanayev
Limnological Institute of the Siberian Branch of RAS, Irkutsk, Russia

E. V. Likhoshvay
Lymnological Institute, Siberian Branch of RAS, 3, Ulan-Batorskaya St., 664033 Irkutsk, Russia

ABSTRACT

Morphology of the diatom alga Aulacoseira baicalensis (K. Meyer) Simonsen dominating in Lake Baikal was studied in its natural populations during a year using light and scanning electron microscopy. At the beginning of the under-ice development of the alga, there were only linking spines in its filaments, and a gradual increase in its colony lengths was registered. The separation spines started to develop when algal cell concentrations in its mucilaginous aggregations reached maximal values. The formation of conical separation spines in colonies, subsequent division of colonies into shorter fragments and then their dispersal in plankton were observed after the ice-melting. An increase in the algal population density, a rise of water temperature and the lowering of phosphate and silicon concentration could play a role of a “signal” to start forming separation valves.