Annelids represent one of the most diverse groups of marine invertebrates inhabiting sea floor from the intertidal zone to hadal depths. Their role in marine communities is quite important as they often dominate in species richness and density. The deep-sea annelid fauna inhabiting cold Norwegian waters deeper than 1000 m is isolated both from the faunas of the shallow waters and the adjacent deep areas of the North Atlantic. It represents the most poorly known component of the whole Norwegian annelid fauna due to scarce sampling or absence of material available for genetic analysis. Recent findings show that biodiversity in the deep-sea environment is highly underestimated with about 40% of the annelid species being undescribed. In the proposed project, we aim to study a number of existing collections of the deep-sea annelids from Norwegian waters, including the localities west of Svalbard, and to sample the new deep-water materials during the two planned cruises. The project will be implemented by a group of scientists representing a well established research network from four major Norwegian research institutions working on annelids and the deep sea: the University Museum of Bergen and the Centre for Geobiology (UiB), the NTNU University Museum, and the Norwegian Institute for Water Research. The project will utilize a substantial amount of materials and data (sorted collections, published barcodes, SEM images) produced by the project partners over the last ten years during ongoing research activities on the Norwegian annelid fauna and will produce new morphological and genetic data to describe and document species diversity in the deep-sea annelids. Based on present information on species richness from a few recently examined annelid families, a likely discovery of app. 40 species new to Norway would be expected. We aim to generate a checklist of the deep Norwegian annelids and several identification keys for selected families. This, in combination with a new library of the deep sea annelid barcodes publicly available in BOLD, will provide a solid basis for future research and nature management in the deep Norwegian waters. Results of the project will be presented during three national and two international scientific conferences and will be available to the general public via the project blog and creation of the selected species pages with illustrations and descriptions freely available online for a wide audience.
