Distribution And Abundance Of Benthic Foraminifera Along The Intertidal Area Of Penang Island
| dc.contributor.author | Syafiqah Syahirah Shah Rijal | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2021-01-25T02:19:39Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2021-01-25T02:19:39Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2018-09 | |
| dc.description.abstract | The distribution and abundance of benthic foraminifera were studied in the intertidal areas of Penang Island. Five sites were selected namely Batu Feringghi, Jelutong, Pulau Betong, Teluk Aling and Teluk Kumbar. The samples of foraminifera were collected from three different intertidal zones i.e. low, middle and upper zones. A total of 375 sediment samples were collected bimonthly between May 2015 and January 2016. Environmental parameters (i.e. soil pH, salinity and temperature) were measured in-situ. Organic matter content was analyzed based on loss of ignition method (LOI) and particles size was determined based on Bale and Kenny (2005) method. A total of 9 genera of foraminifera were identified which include Ammonia, Elphidium, Quinqueloculina, Pseudorotalia, Bolivina, Nonionellina, Haynesina and Spiroloculina. Generally, the stress-tolerant taxa, Ammonia (64.11 %) and Elphidium (14.23%) dominated the assemblage at all sampling sites. Diversity indices showed that the intertidal area of Jelutong had the most diverse assemblage (H’ =1.61; D = 0.77) and Teluk Kumbar (H’= 0.43; D = 0.33) had the lowest foraminiferal assemblages. The cluster analysis classified the sites into two groups, of which each group was influenced by different environmental conditions. Group A (Batu Feringghi, Teluk Aling and Teluk Kumbar) was characterized as sandy (grained-size = 1 mm ~ 250 μm) with high pH (7.72), salinity (34.00 ppt) and temperature 33.5⁰C) (ANOVA, p<0.05). This group had a higher foraminiferal abundance but relatively low in diversity. Group B (Jelutong and Pulau Betong) consisted of non-sandy beach sampling sites and showed significantly high organic matter content (3.04%, ANOVA, p< 0.05). This group was characterized by low mean abundance but high in diversity. Pearson’s correlation analysis showed that seven genera i.e. Bolivina, Pseudorotalia, Nonionellina, Elphidium, Quinqueloculina, Haynesina and Spiroloculina were positively correlated with coarse sand (1 mm), medium sand (630 μm), mixture sand (425 μm) and fine sand (250 μm). Only fine sand (250 μm) showed both positive and negative correlations with all the genus of foraminifera. The values of FORAM index (FI = 1.0 ~ 2.30) and Ammonia-Elphidium index (AEI = 61 ~ 89) obtained in this study suggested that all selected sites were regarded as under the stressed condition and disturbed. The study also concluded that foraminifera can be used as economically-friendly bio-indicators for monitoring coastal areas in Malaysia. | en_US |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/123456789/11001 | |
| dc.language.iso | en | en_US |
| dc.publisher | Universiti Sains Malaysia | en_US |
| dc.subject | Natural history | en_US |
| dc.subject | Benthic Foraminifera | en_US |
| dc.title | Distribution And Abundance Of Benthic Foraminifera Along The Intertidal Area Of Penang Island | en_US |
| dc.type | Thesis | en_US |
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