23 Kas 2024 Cumartesi
Zooplankton communities in the inland waters of the Kura River Basin (within Azerbaijan)
Abstract :Zooplankton serves as a food object for many other aquatic animals. Zooplankton presents communities of systematically different groups of hydrobionts, mainly microscopic in size. The role of these organisms, comprising the lower links of water basin food chains, is massive due to their development affecting living conditions of organisms much higher in the food chain, including an array of commercial fish species. Freshwater zooplankton communities consist of very different groups, both single-celled and multicellular. Together, they present a single biological system, separate components of which are always in a dynamic balance. Despite the evidence of unity and codependence between these groups, until recently zooplankton research was conducted by specialists in specific groups of animals. Usually, protozoans were studied separately from multicellular microplankton. Only relatively recently have publications with the result of complex research started appearing. In this publication for the first time presented are the result of many years of research on micro- and mesoplankton in Azerbaijan's largest river - Kura.
Zooplankton communities, freeliving ciliates, freshwaters, Kura river basin, Azerbaijan