May Gómez

May Gómez
University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria | ULPGC · Faculty of Marine Sciences. Marine Ecophiyology Group EOMAR

Professor

About

169
Publications
48,008
Reads
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2,864
Citations
Introduction
May Gómez is professor of Zoology at the University Research Institute ECOAQUA, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Canary Islands, Spain). May's Research interests are: Biological oceanography; Zooplankton ecology and physiology; Biogeochemistry; Carbon flux; Metabolism; Respiration, Growth and Production in zooplankton communities; Study of microplastics transfer in the food webs. Her current projects are: 1.- "PERSEO: Study of the respiratory metabolism in the Canary Islands' jellyfish". 2.- "BIOMAR: Effect of Microplastic pollution in Marine Biota".
Additional affiliations
February 2017 - present
University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria
Position
  • Professor
September 1990 - January 2017
University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria
Position
  • Lecturer
Education
September 1986 - June 1991
University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria
Field of study
  • Biological Oceanography
September 1981 - June 1986
University of La Laguna
Field of study
  • Marine Biology

Publications

Publications (169)
Article
Full-text available
Oceanic depth profiles of plankton respiration are described by a power function, RCO2 = (RCO2)0(z=z0)b similar to the vertical carbon flux profile. Furthermore, because both ocean processes are closely related, conceptually and mathematically, each can be calculated from the 5 other. The exponent (b), always negative, defines the maximum curvature...
Article
Full-text available
Plastic production continues to increase every year, yet it is widely acknowledged that a significant portion of this material ends up in ecosystems as microplastics (MPs). Among all the environmental compartments affected by MPs, the atmosphere remains the least well-known. Here, we conducted a one-year simultaneous monitoring of atmospheric MPs d...
Article
Full-text available
Particles from tires are a major fraction of microplastic pollution. They contain a wide range of chemical additives that can leach into the water and be harmful to aquatic organisms. In this study, we investigated the acute toxicity of tire particle leachates in early life stages of three keystone echinoderm species (Paracentrotus lividus, Arbacia...
Article
In this study, we investigated the concentration, distribution, and characteristics of neustonic MPs in the Canary Islands, with a particular focus on the island leeward zones, where a high accumulation of floating marine microplastics is expected. Samples were collected with a manta net at 15 different sites from Alegranza to La Gomera during the...
Article
Microplastic pollution and associated chemical contaminants is a topic of growing interest. In recent years, the number of publications reporting the presence of microplastics (MPs) in marine organisms has increased exponentially. However, there is a gap in knowledge about the trophic transfer of contaminants from microplastics to animal tissues, a...
Article
Plastic pollution constitutes an environmental problem in the Canary Islands nowadays. Nevertheless, studies evaluating the impact of plastics on its avifauna are still scarce. Gastrointestinal tracts of 88 birds belonging to 14 species were studied for the presence of plastics. Moreover, their livers were analyzed for the determination of bromodip...
Article
Alegranza is the most northerly island of the Canary Islands archipelago, the first obstacle crossed by the Canary Current. From July to October 2020, six expeditions were led to the island to make a first inventory of marine debris and its possible source and origin. In total, 3667 objects weighing 321 kg were removed, excluding wooden objects. Of...
Article
Full-text available
Physalia physalis and Velella velella, are among the few marine organisms that harness the wind for their locomotion, whereas other cnidarian jellyfish make use of their pulsating bell-shaped bodies to propel themselves through the seas. We investigate their composition and metabolism compared with two species of pulsating scyphozoan jellyfish, Aur...
Article
Ocean acidification (OA) is one of the most critical anthropogenic threats to marine ecosystems. While significant ecological responses of plankton communities to OA have been revealed mainly by small-scale laboratory approaches, the interactive effect of OA-related changes on zooplankton metabolism and their biogeochemical implications in the natu...
Article
Full-text available
Microplastic ingestion was studied in A. aurita, a bloom-forming, circumglobal medusa. Here, we determined whether factors such as the concentration of polyethylene microspheres (75–90 μm) or the absence/presence of prey affect the ingestion, duration of microspheres in the gastrovascular cavity (time of presence), and retention time. The presence...
Article
Full-text available
Marine microplastic pollution is one of the biggest environmental problems we face. The growth of plastic production has not ceased since the 1950s and it is currently estimated that 368 tons of plastic were produced in 2019 (PlascticsEurope, 2020). Geyer et al. (2017) estimate that 79% of the plastic produced in the world still remains in the envi...
Article
Full-text available
Sediment core samples from high tide lines and in submerged zones as well as surface water samples from eight beaches of Tenerife were analysed. Sampling was conducted over a period of one year in intervals of 5 weeks. The majority of particles were found in the high tide sediment (66%), followed by water samples (23%) and finally in sediment from...
Article
Full-text available
Plastic litter dispersed in the different environmental compartments represents one of the most concerning problems associated with human activities. Specifically, plastic particles in the micro and nano size scale are ubiquitous and represent a threat to human health and the environment. In the last few decades, a huge amount of research has been...
Article
Plastic pollution has become a global problem for marine ecosystems. Microplastics (MPs) are consumed by several marine organisms, including benthic and pelagic fish species that confuse them with food sources, thus contributing to bioaccumulation along the food chain. In addition to structural intestinal damage, ingestion of MPs represents a pathw...
Article
Full-text available
The presence of microplastics (MPs) in the marine environment is a concerning topic due to the ecotoxicological effects and possible seafood contamination. Data is needed to evaluate human exposure and assess risks, in the context of a healthy and beneficial seafood consumption. While microplastic ingestion by wild fish has been reported since the...
Article
Full-text available
Plastics are the most important component in marine debris. In turn, within plastics, microplastics (<5 mm) are those that most affect marine biota. Thus, this review has as its main objective to show the current state of studies of microplastics, as well as to determine the groups of vertebrates most affected by microplastics, and the type and pre...
Article
The present study is the first evidence-based study about the ingestion of plastic and microplastics in jellyfish Pelagia noctiluca in the North Atlantic Ocean. A bloom of this organism was collected from Gran Canaria Island coast. It was digested using KOH to quantify the plastic particles and by separating the umbrella from tentacles. About 97% o...
Article
The quantification of microplastics is a needed task to monitor its evolution and model its behavior. However, it is a time demanding task traditionally performed using expensive equipment. In this paper, an architecture based on deep learning networks is presented with the aim of automatically count and classify microplastic particles in the range...
Article
Full-text available
In the autumn of 2014, nine large mesocosms were deployed in the oligotrophic subtropical North-Atlantic coastal waters off Gran Canaria (Spain). Their deployment was designed to address the acidification effects of CO2 levels from 400 to 1,400 μatm, on a plankton community experiencing upwelling of nutrient-rich deep water. Among other parameters,...
Article
Measuring protein is critical to many investigations in oceanography and marine biology. Here, we compared seven colorimetric protein assays (Rutter, Rutter-SDS, Markwell, BCA, microBCA, Bradford and microBradford) for measuring protein in a mysid (Leptomysis lingvura), in a jellyfish (Pelagia noctiluca), and in three different size fractions of ma...
Article
In order to understand the origin of plastic debris pollutants that accumulate in the Canary Islands coastline, six beaches of Gran Canaria Island were studied during different seasons to estimate the abundance and the types of two microplastics fraction sizes (0.01-1 mm and 1-5 mm) and mesoplastics fraction (5-25 mm). For the larger fraction of mi...
Article
Marine microplastic pollution is an issue of great concern nowadays since high concentrations have been detected in the ocean, mainly in the subtropical gyres that accumulate this type of debris. The long-term effects of this pollution on ecosystems and marine biota are still unknown. The aim of this study is to quantify and characterise microplast...
Article
Stranded marine debris from eight beaches of Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain) was analyzed. Sampling was conducted along the high tide line every 35 m over the whole lengths in periods of 5 weeks for one year. Evaluated particles included all materials bigger than 2 mm, which were subdivided in Mesoparticles (2-10 mm) and Macroparticles (>10 mm). T...
Article
Full-text available
The management of plastic debris is a serious issue due to its durability. Unfortunately, million tons of plastic end up in the sea becoming one of the biggest current environmental problems. One way to monitor the amount of plastic in beaches is to collect samples and visually count and sort the plastic particles present in them. This is a very ti...
Article
Full-text available
Because Aurelia spp. blooms have important regional effects, it is urgent to determine factors that may affect their proliferation and their effects on food webs. The life cycle of most scyphozoans includes an attached stage (polyp or scyphistoma) that reproduces asexually. To test the effects of food availability (unfed, fed 1-, 2-, or 3-times wee...
Article
Full-text available
Aims The aims of this study were: a) to describe the pathological and laboratory findings in a case series of stranding and mortality associated with ingestion of large amounts of sea urchins in loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta), and b) to alert veterinarians and biologists involved in sea turtle conservation of this cause of stranding and/or de...
Article
Full-text available
We have calculated new production from phytoplankton nitrate reductase (NR) activity and light in the euphotic zone of the Peruvian upwelling system at 15° S. The calculation is based on unique measurements from the Coastal Upwelling Ecosystem Analysis (CUEA) JASON expedition from September 1976. The new production at the 50% light level in the eup...
Article
Given their capacity to adsorb chemical pollutants, microplastics represent a growing environmental concern in the oceans. The levels of 81 chemical compounds in two types of beached microplastic (pellets and fragments) were monitored across the Canary Islands (Spain). The highest concentrations were found for polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH)...
Article
NADP⁺-isocitrate dehydrogenase (NADP-IDH), as one of the most active intracellular CO2-producing enzymes, was measured in marine plankton by adapting an enzyme assay to the 0.7-50 μm, 50–200 μm, and 200-2000 μm size fraction of the Canary Islands coastal plankton community. The variability of NADP-IDH activity in relation to pH, temperature, diluti...
Article
Microplastics are small plastic particles, globally distributed throughout the oceans. To properly study them, all the methodologies for their sampling, extraction, and measurement should be standardized. For heterogeneous samples containing sediments, animal tissues and zooplankton, several procedures have been described. However, definitive metho...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Microplastic particles have become an important ecological problem due to the huge amount of plastics debris that ends up in the sea. An additional impact is the ingestion of microplastics by marine species, and thus microplastics enter into the food chain with unpredictable effects on humans. In addition to the exploration of their presence in fis...
Article
Full-text available
Aerobic respiration is a biological energy generation process that consumes organic carbon and oxygen. In the ocean, the balance between photosynthesis and respiration is recognized as critical to understanding the ocean’s impact on the hydrospheric and atmospheric CO2. Techniques to determine respiration can be based on inorganic chemistry, electr...
Data
Relationship between number of particles/weight in total debris, microplastics (MPs) and tar (1-5mm). *Samples include tar and microplastics.
Article
Marine debris accumulation was analyzed from three exposed beaches of the Canary Islands (Lambra, Famara and Las Canteras). Large microplastics (1-5mm), mesoplastics (5-25mm) and tar pollution were assessed twice a month for a year. There was great spatial and temporal variability in the Canary Island coastal pollution. Seasonal patterns differed a...
Article
The vertical fluxes of particulate organic matter play a crucial role in the distribution of nutrients throughout the oceans. Although they have been the focus of intensive research, little effort has been made to explore alternative approaches that quantify the particle export at a high spatial resolution. In this study, we assess the minimum nitr...
Article
Glutamate dehydrogenase (GDH) activities have been widely used in oceanographic research as an index of in situ NH4⁺ excretion rates ( ) in zooplankton. Here we study the variability in the relationship between the enzymatic rates and the actual rates measured in epipelagic marine zooplankton between several marine ecosystems. Although both measure...
Article
Full-text available
Oxygen consumption rates (\(R_{{{\text{O}}_{2} }}\)) in the rotifer Brachionus plicatilis and the mysid Leptomysis lingvura during both well-fed conditions and starvation have been modeled using the electron transport system (ETS) activity, bisubstrate kinetics and intracellular concentration of substrates. Furthermore, the influence of the food qu...
Article
Full-text available
NH4+ production in 2 species of marine zooplankton was predicted from glutamate dehydrogenase (GDH) activity using general bisubstrate enzyme kinetics during a period of starvation. In addition to starvation, we studied the effect of food quality on both NH4+ excretion rates (RNH4+) and the biochemical composition of zooplankton. The mathematical f...
Poster
Full-text available
We present preliminary results of microplastic measurements in sediments collected in Las Canteras beach, Canary Islands
Article
Full-text available
We have studied the in vivo respiratory oxygen consumption ( R O 2 ) (RO2) and the potential respiration rates (Φ), measured by the enzymatic activity of the electron transport system (ETS), in epipelagic marine zooplankton from several marine systems. Furthermore, we have determined the intracellular concentration of the ETS substrates, i.e. the p...
Article
Full-text available
Protein is an important biomass parameter and critical in the enzyme analysis of plankton. When plankton biomass is abundant, obtaining protein samples is not difficult. However, when biomass is a scarce quantity and it needs to be used for many other measurements, obtaining sufficient material for a protein sample is a challenge. If the protein an...
Article
Full-text available
Oceanic depth profiles of plankton respiration are described by a power function, RCO2 = (RCO2 )0 (z/z0)b, similar to the vertical carbon flux profile. Furthermore, because both ocean processes are closely related, conceptually and mathematically, each can be calculated from the other. The exponent b, always negative, defines the maximum curvature...
Poster
ABSTRACT Nutrient retention efficiency (NRE) is a new metric to quantify the capacity of an ocean layer to maintain its nutrients. Conceptually, it is the remineralization of inorganic nutrients associated with respiratory CO2 production (RCO2) within an ocean layer normalized by nutrients fluxing into that layer. It can be expressed as a ratio or...
Poster
Both respiration (R) and ammonium excretion (R-NH4+) are critical processes in marine ecology, serving to counter balance productivity and synthesis. Furthermore, this balance controls the efficiency of the net production. Enzymatic assays are important tools for monitoring the zooplankton metabolism. True, their requirement of substrate saturation...
Article
Full-text available
Respiratory metabolism was compared between 2 different physiological states of acetate- and pyruvate-grown cultures of Pseudomonas nautica and Vibrio natriegens. Here, we analyze 35 h and 520 h experiments in which time-courses of protein, pyruvate, acetate, respiratory CO2 production (RCO2), respiratory O2 consumption (RO2), isocitrate dehydrogen...
Article
The distribution of zooplankton biomass and potential metabolic rates, in terms of electron transport system (ETS) and glutamate dehydrogenase (GDH), were analyzed along a cross-shelf transect in waters off Namibia. The highly variable dynamics of upwelling filaments promoted short-term fluctuations in the zooplankton biomass and metabolism. Maximu...
Article
Seagrass meadows are important ecosystems on shallow coastal waters, maintaining a high diversity of species. Mysids are the dominant taxa of suprabenthic organisms associated with seagrass meadows in temperate coastal waters, where they are an important food resource for the coastal fishes. Five meadows of Cymodocea nodosa were sampled off the eas...
Presentation
Oral communication at an International Symposium, concerning the impact that the zooplankton metabolism exerts on the primary productivity from the northern Benguela.