Climate change disables coral bleaching protection on the Great Barrier Reef
Climate change disables coral bleaching protection on the Great Barrier Reef
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DOI：
10.1126/science.aac7125
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发表时间：
2016-04-15
期刊：
影响因子：
56.9
通讯作者：
Leggat, William
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Ainsworth, Tracy D.;Heron, Scott F.;Leggat, William
珊瑚白化事件威胁着大堡礁（GBR）的可持续性。在这里，我们表明，过去三十年的漂白事件已经减轻了诱导的热耐受性的造礁珊瑚，这种保护机制很可能会失去在不久的将来的气候变化情景。我们发现，过去75%的热应力事件的特点是温度轨迹，使珊瑚在达到导致漂白的温度之前受到保护性的亚漂白应力。这样的条件赋予耐热性，减少珊瑚细胞死亡率和共生体损失超过50%漂白过程中。我们发现，在不久的将来，局部温度升高0.5摄氏度会导致这种保护机制丧失，这可能会增加GBR的降解速率。
Coral bleaching events threaten the sustainability of the Great Barrier Reef (GBR). Here we show that bleaching events of the past three decades have been mitigated by induced thermal tolerance of reef-building corals, and this protective mechanism is likely to be lost under near-future climate change scenarios. We show that 75% of past thermal stress events have been characterized by a temperature trajectory that subjects corals to a protective, sub-bleaching stress, before reaching temperatures that cause bleaching. Such conditions confer thermal tolerance, decreasing coral cell mortality and symbiont loss during bleaching by over 50%. We find that near-future increases in local temperature of as little as 0.5 degrees C result in this protective mechanism being lost, which may increase the rate of degradation of the GBR.