Polar Ecology - Still Unexplored?

Still Unexplored?

In a meta analysis of the published work in aquatic ecosystems since the term biodiversity appeared in the bibliography, the Arctic and Antarctic Polar regions were found to still be unexplored. In addition, the North Pacific Ocean (Pacific Northeast and Pacific Northwest), still has few citations in comparison to its large size. This limits our perception of the world’s aquatic biodiversity. Consequently we do not have sufficient information about biodiversity in most places on earth. Even though biodiversity declines from the equator to the poles in terrestrial ecosystems, this is still a hypothesis to be tested in aquatic and especially marine ecosystems where causes of this phenomenon are unclear. In addition, particularly in marine ecosystems, there are several well stated cases where diversity in higher latitudes actually increases (Moustakas et al. 2005). Therefore, the lack of information on biodiversity of Polar Regions prevents scientific conclusions on the distribution of the world’s aquatic biodiversity.