Collaborative Research: Tipping points in coral reefs and their associated microbiomes: interactive effects of corallivory, herbivory, and nutrient pollution

合作研究：珊瑚礁及其相关微生物群的临界点：珊瑚食性、食草性和营养物污染的相互作用

• 批准号: 2023424
• 负责人: Rebecca Vega
• 金额: $ 79.99万
• 依托单位: Oregon State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-08-15 至 2024-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2023424&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Tipping; points; coral

Coral reefs are some of the most diverse, yet most imperiled, ecosystems on the planet. Global change has driven the decline of corals worldwide with many reefs now lacking corals and being overrun by macroalgae. This research examines the impacts of several factors of thermal stress, overfishing of important herbivorous fishes, and nutrient pollution on the health of corals and their ability to recover after large coral-killing disturbances. Importantly, the investigators address the impacts of global change on the coral microbiome, the microbes that associate with corals and impact coral health. The overarching hypothesis is that factors such as overfishing and nutrient pollution impact coral health via impacts to their microbes. This 6-year experiment on the coral reefs of Mo’orea, French Polynesia to examines what levels of herbivory, mostly by parrotfishes and surgeonfishes, are needed to provide resistance and resilience of corals and their microbiomes when reefs are exposed to elevated nutrients and ocean temperatures. Notably, the team tests how local stressors (overfishing, nutrient pollution) potentially interact with global stressors (climate change and rising ocean temperatures) to impact coral reef health. This research may yield insight into how to manage local factors (reducing fishing, mitigating nutrient pollution) to help corals survive the global stress of climate change. The field experiment provides a realistic platform to test questions about how local management of fisheries can alter reef health and provides data about the recoverability of reefs should new water quality management be put into place. This interdisciplinary work trains a new generation of both marine ecologists and microbiologists, including one postdoctoral researcher, two graduate students, as well as numerous undergraduates. The main international outreach effort is to map the microbiome of the island of Mo’orea. Mo’orea is approximately 130 square-kilometers in area and has five major watersheds that transport sediment and nutrients to the nearshore coral reef ecosystems. Thus poor stewardship of these watersheds likely contributes to the local phase shifts currently occurring in several areas of the lagoon. Therefore the team has engaged the local community to help collect microbiome samples from 50 terrestrial, 50 stream, 25 coastal sites, and 25 offshore sites around the island. The sampling effort is generating an island-wide map of the microbial communities associated with the soils, streams, and coastal waters that can be linked to adjacent coral reef health - The Moorea Microbiome! As part of this outreach effort, the team also collaborates with filmmakers to make a trilingual (English, French, and Tahitian) film about the project to serve as local engagement and teaching tool to help educate school groups and different stakeholders about both the seen and unseen connections between land and sea on their island. On the island of Mo’orea, French Polynesia, coral communities have exhibited strikingly different trajectories, with some reefs recovering from disturbances and others undergoing protracted coral decline, accompanied by an increase in macroalgae. This diversity in coral community dynamics makes Mo’orea an excellent model system for testing why some reefs are resilient and return to abundant coral while others are not and undergo persistent phase shifts to macroalgal dominance. This 6-year experiment will measure the dynamics of benthic communities, coral demography, and the coral microbiome across seasonal change in ocean temperature, allowing the team to (1) link changes in coral microbiomes (e.g., a rise in pathogenic bacteria) to the trajectories of coral decline or recovery and (2) link nutrients, herbivory, and temperature to phase shifts in both benthic communities and coral microbiomes. Importantly, the team is testing the resistance of phase shifts of benthic communities and coral microbiomes by measuring their changes after removing the nutrient enrichment treatment at the end of year 3 and tracking recovery of the system for 3 more years. Thus, this project begins to answer whether reef and microbial community phase shifts can be easily reversed once they occur. Many studies have focused on the factors that disassemble coral reef communities, but this is the first to examine how reef communities can be reassembled from the microbiome upwards.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

珊瑚礁是地球上最多样但最危险的生态系统之一。全球变化导致全球珊瑚数量减少，许多珊瑚礁现在缺乏珊瑚，并被大型藻类泛滥。这项研究考察了热应激、重要草食性鱼类的过度捕捞和营养污染等几个因素对珊瑚健康的影响，以及它们在大规模珊瑚杀灭干扰后恢复的能力。重要的是，研究人员解决了全球变化对珊瑚微生物群的影响，即与珊瑚相关并影响珊瑚健康的微生物。最重要的假设是，过度捕捞和营养污染等因素通过影响珊瑚微生物来影响珊瑚健康。这项为期6年的实验在法属波利尼西亚莫雷亚的珊瑚礁上进行，旨在研究在珊瑚礁暴露在营养物质和海洋温度升高的情况下，需要何种水平的食草动物(主要是鹦鹉鱼和外科鱼)来提供珊瑚及其微生物的抵抗力和弹性。值得注意的是，该团队测试了局部压力因素(过度捕捞、营养物质污染)如何潜在地与全球压力因素(气候变化和海洋温度上升)相互作用，以影响珊瑚礁的健康。这项研究可能对如何管理当地因素(减少捕捞，减轻营养污染)以帮助珊瑚在气候变化的全球压力下生存下来产生洞察。实地试验提供了一个现实的平台，以测试有关当地渔业管理如何改变珊瑚礁健康的问题，并提供了关于如果实行新的水质管理，珊瑚礁可恢复性的数据。这项跨学科的工作培养了新一代海洋生态学家和微生物学家，包括一名博士后研究员、两名研究生以及众多本科生。主要的国际推广工作是绘制莫雷亚岛的微生物群地图。莫雷亚的面积约为130平方公里，有五个主要分水岭，将沉积物和营养物质输送到近岸珊瑚礁生态系统。因此，对这些分水岭的管理不善可能导致目前在环礁湖的几个地区出现的局部相移。因此，该小组已委托当地社区帮助从该岛周围的50个陆地、50个溪流、25个沿海地点和25个近海地点收集微生物样本。采样工作正在生成与土壤、溪流和沿海水域相关的微生物群落的全岛地图，这些微生物群落可以与邻近的珊瑚礁健康联系在一起--Moorea微生物组！作为外展工作的一部分，该团队还与电影制作人合作，制作了一部关于该项目的三种语言(英语、法语和大溪语)的电影，作为当地的参与和教学工具，帮助教育学校团体和不同的利益相关者，让他们了解岛上陆地和海洋之间看得见和看不见的联系。在法属波利尼西亚的莫雷亚岛上，珊瑚群落表现出了惊人的不同轨迹，一些珊瑚礁从干扰中恢复过来，另一些珊瑚礁经历了长期的珊瑚衰退，并伴随着大型藻类的增加。珊瑚群落动态的这种多样性使Moorea成为测试为什么一些珊瑚礁具有弹性并恢复丰富的珊瑚，而另一些珊瑚礁则没有，并经历持续的向大型藻类主导的相变的极好的模式系统。这项为期6年的实验将测量海洋温度季节性变化中底栖群落、珊瑚人口统计学和珊瑚微生物群的动态，使研究小组能够(1)将珊瑚微生物群的变化(例如，病原菌的增加)与珊瑚衰退或恢复的轨迹联系起来，(2)将营养物质、草食和温度与底栖群落和珊瑚微生物群的相变联系起来。重要的是，该团队正在测试底栖群落和珊瑚微生物群落相移的抵抗力，方法是测量它们在第三年年底停止营养强化处理后的变化，并跟踪系统恢复三年以上。因此，这个项目开始回答，珊瑚礁和微生物群落的相变一旦发生，是否可以很容易地逆转。许多研究都集中在分解珊瑚礁群落的因素上，但这是第一次研究如何从微生物群落向上重组珊瑚礁群落。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

项目成果

Positive interactions between corals and damselfish increase coral resistance to temperature stress

• DOI: 10.1111/gcb.16480
• 发表时间: 2022-10
• 期刊: Global Change Biology
• 影响因子: 11.6
• 作者: A. A. Shantz-A.;Mark C. Ladd;Leïla Ezzat;R. Schmitt;S. Holbrook;E. Schmeltzer;Rebecca L. Vega Thurber

Chronic low-level nutrient enrichment benefits coral thermal performance in a fore reef habitat

• DOI: 10.1007/s00338-021-02138-2
• 发表时间: 2021-06-29
• 期刊: CORAL REEFS
• 影响因子: 3.5
• 作者: Becker, Danielle M.;Putnam, Hollie M.;Silbiger, Nyssa J.
• 通讯作者: Silbiger, Nyssa J.