Genotype‐environment mismatch of kelp forests under climate change

Effect of environmental history on the habitat-forming kelp Macrocystis pyrifera responses to ocean acidification and warming: a physiological and molecular approach

Scientific Reports ◽

10.1038/s41598-021-82094-7 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Pamela A. Fernández ◽

Jorge M. Navarro ◽

Carolina Camus ◽

Rodrigo Torres ◽

Alejandro H. Buschmann

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Ocean Acidification ◽

Environmental History ◽

Coastal Upwelling ◽

Macrocystis Pyrifera ◽

Natural Variability ◽

Kelp Forests ◽

Species Response ◽

Enhanced Expression ◽

Mesocosm Experiments

AbstractThe capacity of marine organisms to adapt and/or acclimate to climate change might differ among distinct populations, depending on their local environmental history and phenotypic plasticity. Kelp forests create some of the most productive habitats in the world, but globally, many populations have been negatively impacted by multiple anthropogenic stressors. Here, we compare the physiological and molecular responses to ocean acidification (OA) and warming (OW) of two populations of the giant kelp Macrocystis pyrifera from distinct upwelling conditions (weak vs strong). Using laboratory mesocosm experiments, we found that juvenile Macrocystis sporophyte responses to OW and OA did not differ among populations: elevated temperature reduced growth while OA had no effect on growth and photosynthesis. However, we observed higher growth rates and NO3− assimilation, and enhanced expression of metabolic-genes involved in the NO3− and CO2 assimilation in individuals from the strong upwelling site. Our results suggest that despite no inter-population differences in response to OA and OW, intrinsic differences among populations might be related to their natural variability in CO2, NO3− and seawater temperatures driven by coastal upwelling. Further work including additional populations and fluctuating climate change conditions rather than static values are needed to precisely determine how natural variability in environmental conditions might influence a species’ response to climate change.

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Effects of elevated temperature and sedimentation on grazing rates of the green sea urchin: implications for kelp forests exposed to increased sedimentation with climate change

Helgoland Marine Research ◽

10.1186/s10152-019-0526-x ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 73 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Sarah B. Traiger

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Elevated Temperature ◽

Sea Urchin ◽

Strongylocentrotus Droebachiensis ◽

Kelp Forests ◽

Green Sea Urchin ◽

Kelp Bed ◽

Elevated Water ◽

And Shifts ◽

Urchin Grazing

Abstract Sea urchin grazing rates can strongly impact kelp bed persistence. Elevated water temperature associated with climate change may increase grazing rates; however, these effects may interact with local stressors such as sedimentation, which may inhibit grazing. In Alaska, glacial melt is increasing with climate change, resulting in higher sedimentation rates, which are often associated with lower grazer abundance and shifts in macroalgal species composition. The short-term effects of elevated temperature and sediment on grazing were investigated for the green sea urchin, Strongylocentrotus droebachiensis (O.F. Müller, 1776), in Kachemak Bay, Alaska (59° 37′ 45.00″ N, 151° 36′ 38.40″ W) in early May 2017. Feeding assays were conducted at ambient temperature (6.9–9.8 °C) and at 13.8–14.6 °C with no sediment and under a high sediment load. Grazing rates significantly decreased in the presence of sediment, but were not significantly affected by temperature. Along with sediment impacts on settlement and post-settlement survival, grazing inhibition may contribute to the commonly observed pattern of decreased macroinvertebrate grazer abundance in areas of high sedimentation and increased sedimentation in the future may alter sea urchin grazing in kelp forests.

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The economic value of fisheries, blue carbon, and nutrient cycling in global marine forests

10.32942/osf.io/n7kjs ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Aaron Matthius Eger ◽

Ezequiel Marzinelli ◽

Rodrigo Baes ◽

Caitlin Blain ◽

Laura Blamey ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Ecosystem Services ◽

Nutrient Cycling ◽

Nitrogen Removal ◽

Climate Change Mitigation ◽

Economic Value ◽

Blue Carbon ◽

Kelp Forests ◽

Marine Management ◽

Change Mitigation

Underwater kelp forests have provided valuable ecosystem services for millennia. However, the global economic value of those services is largely unresolved. Kelp forests are also diminishing globally and efforts to manage these valuable resources are hindered without accurate estimates of the services kelp forests provide to society. We present the first global economic estimation of services - fisheries production, nutrient cycling, and carbon removal - provided by four major forest forming kelp genera (Macrocystis, Nereocystis, Ecklonia, and Laminaria). Each of these genera provides between $135,200 and $177,100/ ha/ year. Collectively, they contribute $684 billion/year worldwide. These values are primarily driven by fisheries and nitrogen removal, but kelp forests also have the potential to sequester 2.7 megatons of carbon from the atmosphere/year and may be considered blue carbon systems valuable for climate change mitigation. These findings highlight the value of kelp forests to society and will enable informed marine management decisions.

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Extreme warming challenges sentinel status of kelp forests as indicators of climate change

Nature Communications ◽

10.1038/ncomms13757 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 7 (1) ◽

Cited By ~ 49

Author(s):

Daniel Reed ◽

Libe Washburn ◽

Andrew Rassweiler ◽

Robert Miller ◽

Tom Bell ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Kelp Forests

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Predicting ecological regime shift under climate change: New modelling techniques and potential of molecular-based approaches

Current Zoology ◽

10.1093/czoolo/59.3.403 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 59 (3) ◽

pp. 403-417 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Richard Stafford ◽

V. Anne Smith ◽

Dirk Husmeier ◽

Thomas Grima ◽

Barbara-ann Guinn

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Bayesian Network ◽

Species Interactions ◽

Rocky Shore ◽

Regime Shift ◽

Predictive Modelling ◽

Kelp Forests ◽

Stable Regime ◽

Ecological Regime ◽

Stable Community

Abstract Ecological regime shift is the rapid transition from one stable community structure to another, often ecologically inferior, stable community. Such regime shifts are especially common in shallow marine communities, such as the transition of kelp forests to algal turfs that harbour far lower biodiversity. Stable regimes in communities are a result of balanced interactions between species, and predicting new regimes therefore requires an evaluation of new species interactions, as well as the resilience of the ‘stable’ position. While computational optimisation techniques can predict new potential regimes, predicting the most likely community state of the various options produced is currently educated guess work. In this study we integrate a stable regime optimisation approach with a Bayesian network used to infer prior knowledge of the likely stress of climate change (or, in practice, any other disturbance) on each component species of a representative rocky shore community model. Combining the results, by calculating the product of the match between resilient computational predictions and the posterior probabilities of the Bayesian network, gives a refined set of model predictors, and demonstrates the use of the process in determining community changes, as might occur through processes such as climate change. To inform Bayesian priors, we conduct a review of molecular approaches applied to the analysis of the transcriptome of rocky shore organisms, and show how such an approach could be linked to meas-ureable stress variables in the field. Hence species-specific microarrays could be designed as biomarkers of in situ stress, and used to inform predictive modelling approaches such as those described here.

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Averting robo-bees: why free-flying robotic bees are a bad idea

Emerging Topics in Life Sciences ◽

10.1042/etls20190063 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 3 (6) ◽

pp. 723-729

Author(s):

Roslyn Gleadow ◽

Jim Hanan ◽

Alan Dorin

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Computer Simulation ◽

Food Security ◽

European Countries ◽

Plant Interactions ◽

Plant Insect Interactions ◽

Native Habitat ◽

Insect Pollinators ◽

Insect Interactions

Food security and the sustainability of native ecosystems depends on plant-insect interactions in countless ways. Recently reported rapid and immense declines in insect numbers due to climate change, the use of pesticides and herbicides, the introduction of agricultural monocultures, and the destruction of insect native habitat, are all potential contributors to this grave situation. Some researchers are working towards a future where natural insect pollinators might be replaced with free-flying robotic bees, an ecologically problematic proposal. We argue instead that creating environments that are friendly to bees and exploring the use of other species for pollination and bio-control, particularly in non-European countries, are more ecologically sound approaches. The computer simulation of insect-plant interactions is a far more measured application of technology that may assist in managing, or averting, ‘Insect Armageddon' from both practical and ethical viewpoints.

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Modelling ecosystem adaptation and dangerous rates of global warming

Emerging Topics in Life Sciences ◽

10.1042/etls20180113 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 3 (2) ◽

pp. 221-231 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Rebecca Millington ◽

Peter M. Cox ◽

Jonathan R. Moore ◽

Gabriel Yvon-Durocher

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Global Warming ◽

Diffusion Rate ◽

Individual Species ◽

Genetic Evolution ◽

Rates Of Change ◽

Rapid Climate Change ◽

Warming Climate ◽

Intraspecies Competition ◽

High Trait

Abstract We are in a period of relatively rapid climate change. This poses challenges for individual species and threatens the ecosystem services that humanity relies upon. Temperature is a key stressor. In a warming climate, individual organisms may be able to shift their thermal optima through phenotypic plasticity. However, such plasticity is unlikely to be sufficient over the coming centuries. Resilience to warming will also depend on how fast the distribution of traits that define a species can adapt through other methods, in particular through redistribution of the abundance of variants within the population and through genetic evolution. In this paper, we use a simple theoretical ‘trait diffusion’ model to explore how the resilience of a given species to climate change depends on the initial trait diversity (biodiversity), the trait diffusion rate (mutation rate), and the lifetime of the organism. We estimate theoretical dangerous rates of continuous global warming that would exceed the ability of a species to adapt through trait diffusion, and therefore lead to a collapse in the overall productivity of the species. As the rate of adaptation through intraspecies competition and genetic evolution decreases with species lifetime, we find critical rates of change that also depend fundamentally on lifetime. Dangerous rates of warming vary from 1°C per lifetime (at low trait diffusion rate) to 8°C per lifetime (at high trait diffusion rate). We conclude that rapid climate change is liable to favour short-lived organisms (e.g. microbes) rather than longer-lived organisms (e.g. trees).

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