IMIS

From 1993-1998 the benthic community was sampled in the framework of the Ocean Margin Exchange Project (OMEX) at several locations at the Northern Gulf of Biscay (OMEX-I) and the Iberian Coast (OMEX-II). OMEX aims were to study, measure and model the physical, chemical and biological processes and fluxes happening at the ocean margin - the interface between the open Atlantic ocean and the European continental shelf. It served as a basis for the development of predictive models of global environmental changes on the oceanic system and, more specifically, on the coastal zone. This dataset mainly contains data on biomass, biodiversity and feeding type of macrofauna, but also meio- and microfauna were sampled. For certain sampling locations, abiotic data (sediment grain size, flow velocity, dissolved oxygen concentration,..) are also available.