Seasonal effects on microplankton response to oil perturbation on Mississippi-Alabama shelf, Gulf of Mexico from 2016-01-24 to 2017-03-16

In order to understand the role of biodiversity in increasing resiliency to perturbation, a set of experiments were conducted to examine the response of microplankton to the oil perturbation conditions present in 2016 and 2017. Results of various treatments where cells respond to 1 ppm of water-accommodated fraction (WAF) of crude oil, 1 ppm of chemical-enhanced WAF (using industrial dispersant, CEWAF), dispersant only (Disp, using volume of dispersent without crude) and control conditions, are reported here. All experiments received 1 ppm petrocarbon addition except June 2016 (10 ppm with associated WAF, CEWAF, Disp treatments).