FN Archimer Export Format
PT J
TI Submesoscale ocean fronts act as biological hotspot for southern elephant seal
BT 
AF Siegelman, Lia
   O’Toole, Malcolm
   Flexas, Mar
   Rivière, Pascal
   Klein, Patrice
AS 1:1,2,3;2:4;3:2;4:1;5:2,3;
FF 1:;2:;3:;4:;5:;
C1 Univ. Brest, CNRS, IRD, Ifremer, LEMAR, Plouzané, France
   California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
   Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
   UWA Oceans Institute, Indian Ocean Marine Research Centre, University of Western Australia, Crawley, WA, 6009, Australia
C2 UBO, FRANCE
   CALTECH, USA
   JET PROP LAB, USA
   UNIV WESTERN AUSTRALIA, AUSTRALIA
UM LOPS
   LEMAR
IN WOS Cotutelle UMR
   DOAJ
   copubli-int-hors-europe
IF 3.998
TC 34
UR https://archimer.ifremer.fr/doc/00489/60038/63305.pdf
   https://archimer.ifremer.fr/doc/00489/60038/63306.pdf
LA English
DT Article
AB The area west of the Kerguelen Islands (20–70°E/45–60°S) is characterized by a weak mesoscale activity except for a standing meander region of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC) localized between 20 and 40°E. A unique bio-physical dataset at high-resolution collected by a southern elephant seal (Mirounga leonina) reveals a conspicuous increase in foraging activity at the standing meander site up to 5 times larger than during the rest of her three-month trip west of the Kerguelen Islands. Here, we propose a physical explanation for such high biological activity based on the study of small-scale fronts with scales of 5 to 20 km, also called submesoscales. The standing meander is associated with intensified frontal dynamics at submesoscale, not observed in the rest of the region. Results shed new light on the spatial distribution of submesoscale fronts in the under-sampled area west of the Kerguelen plateau and emphasize their importance for upper trophic levels. Despite that most elephant seals target foraging grounds east of the Kerguelen Plateau, our findings suggest that excursions to the west are not accidental, and may be explained by the recurrently elevated physical and biological activity of the site. As such, other standing meanders of the ACC may also act as biological hotspots where trophic interactions are stimulated by submesoscale turbulence. 
PY 2019
PD APR
SO Scientific Reports
SN 2045-2322
PU Springer Nature
VL 9
IS 1
UT 000463178500049
DI 10.1038/s41598-019-42117-w
ID 60038
ER

EF