3.2 | The factors that
influence the diversity of the
community
Analysis of rarefaction curve with iNEXT (Hsieh et al., 2016) indicated
that all samples are sufficiently sequenced to represent its identity
(Figure S1). PERMANOVA analysis was used to determine which of the 4
factors - Transect, Time (day and night), Station and Size Fraction,
explain the variations of the community diversity (Table 1). The factor
that explained the largest variation was the Size Fraction with
R2 of 0.38 (P = 0.0001). Time (day and night)
and Transect (South and North-West) also significantly influenced the
diversity of the communities among samples (R2 =
0.08125 and 0.04914 ; P = 0.0002 and 0.0013, respectively).
However, Station, which represents the distance of sampling sites from
the shore on each transect, showed no significant influence on the
community’s diversity (P = 0.051). The same patterns were
observed in the alpha diversity values. There was no nearshore -
offshore gradient between Stations (Figure 3). In general, higher
diversity was observed in Size Fraction 2 (Figure 4). In the North-West
samples, there was a higher diversity during the night samples than
during the day, however, the same pattern was not evident in the
communities of the South transect.