The role and composition of winter picoeukaryotic assemblages in shallow Central European great lakes

Studies on autotrophic picoplankton (APP; < 3 μm) in shallow lakes are mainly confined to the spring through fall seasons, when sampling efforts are not complicated by adverse and unsafe conditions that occur during winter. The aim of the present work was to study the role and diversity of winter APP communities in temperate shallow lakes by means of analysis of measures of size-fractionated photosynthesis and culture-based molecular taxonomic...