월등한 한국해양의 생물다양성

Abstract

Marine species richness in a unit area of the sea bed in the Korean waters is ranked at the top among the high species-rich regions of the world1,2. The high species richness can be attributable to the presence of diverse habitats, the occurrence of both warm and cold currents, and the high primary production. Korea is a peninsular surrounded by marginal seas in the west Pacific. The East sea is deep down to 4,000m in depth and provides rocky or sandy shores. The south sea has thousands of islands and well-developed wetlands on the shores. The west sea is featured by a few kilometer-wide tidal flats. The Tsushima warm current and the North Korea cold current bring subarctic and subtropical marine organisms to the temperate Korean waters. The primary production is as high as 500mgC/m2/day in the Korean waters which represents also the top level in the world3. Up until now, approximately 9,900 marine species are reported. diatoms (1,835 species), dinoflagellates (328), and silicoflagellates (6) comprise the main groups of phytoplankton and rhodophytes (566), phaeophytes (176), and chlorophytes (128) for the marine algae. Marine invertebrates recoded 5,443 species of which the main groups are mollusks (1,882), crustaceans (1,387), annelids (513), cnidarians (324), poriferans (267), and echinoderms (186). Fish species reaches up to 1,121 in number consisting of 219 families and 613 genera. It is expected that more than thirty thousands marine species would be found in Korean waters. Information on Korea marine organisms is stored in both KOMBIS (Korea marine biodiversity information system) and KOBIS (Korea ocean biogeographic information system), being serviced to the public through internet as well as the mobiles. 1. Costello et al., A Census of Marine Biodiversity Knowledge, Resources, and Future Challenges, PLoS One, Vol.5(8), e12110, 1-5, 2010. 2. Tittensor et al,, Global patterns and predictors of marine biodiversity across taxa, Nature, Vol.466, pp.1098-