The Census of Marine Zooplankton (CMarZ) will work toward a taxonomically comprehensive assessment of biodiversity of animal plankton throughout the world ocean. The project goal is to produce accurate and complete information on zooplankton species diversity, biomass, biogeographical distribution, genetic diversity, and community structure by 2010. Our taxonomic focus is the animals that drift with ocean currents throughout their lives (i.e., the holozooplankton). This assemblage currently includes ~6,800 described species in fifteen phyla; our expectation is that at least that many new species will be discovered as a result of our efforts. The census will encompass unique marine environments and those likely to be inhabited by endemic and undescribed zooplankton species. These include the mesopelagic and abyssopelagic realms, open ocean, benthic b oundary layer, and waters around hydrothermal vents, seep and deep-sea coral beds.
CMarZ will result in more complete knowledge of biodiversity hotspots and unexplored ocean regions, new understanding of the functional role of biodiversity in ocean ecosystems, and better characterization of global-scale patterns of zooplankton biodiversity in the world ocean. CMarZ will increase our understanding of the pattern, flow, and development (over generational, ecological, and evolutionary time scales) of life in the sea. The knowledge gained will contribute to our fundamental understanding of biogeochemical transports, fluxes and sinks; productivity of living marine resources; and structure and function of marine ecosystems.
Using existing technology, as well as accelerating the development of new tools, a global-scale, taxonomically comprehensive census of zooplankton is both feasible and achievable by the CoML target date of 2010.
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