Abstract We report on the collection of two phaeodarian protists from the deep Fram Strait (Arctic Ocean). Specimens were collected using high-volume plankton pumps in the Long-Term Ecological Observatory HAUSGARTEN in 2021. The 18S sequences from our specimens formed two distinct clusters in a phylogenetic tree: one in the family Aulacanthidae and one in the genus Auloscena . The vast majority of phaeodarian species that have been taxonomically described do not have publicly available sequence data (≥95%), so our specimens likely represent species that have been described morphologically but not sequenced. Phaeodarians are an understudied group, despite their abundance and importance for carbon and silica flux. Further exploration will likely reveal a more thorough characterization of biodiversity in the deep Arctic Ocean.
Meyer-Kaiser et al. (Thu,) studied this question.