Tasks:

• Identification, DNA extraction and amplification of polychaetes sampled by box-corer
• Ecological analysis on R (diversity estimators, constrained ordination, species range, betadiversity)

Aims of the first publication (1) to test the hypotheses that support spatial conservation planning in the CCFZ, particularly the environmental drivers of alpha and beta diversity such as organic carbon fluxes to the seafloor and nodule density; (2) to assess the representativeness of an APEI (i.e., APEI no. 3); and (3) to improve the assessment of potential risks of biodiversity loss due to nodule mining.

Tasks:

• Benthic macrofauna sampling with ROV, epibenthic sledge and box-corer onboard of RV SONNE
• Identification of polynoids and species descriptions
• DNA extraction and amplification
• Phylogenetic analysis on MrBayes, RAxML and PAUP

Aims of first publication: (1) to describe 17 new species of deep-sea polynoids using morphology together with molecular data in most cases (COI, 16S and 18S); and (2) to assess the monophyly of the subfamily Macellicephalinae.