Effects of combined climate change stressors on coral reef fish offspring

气候变化综合压力因​​素对珊瑚礁鱼类后代的影响

• 批准号: 393711240
• 负责人: Dr. Björn Illing
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Research Fellowships
• 财政年份: 2017
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2016-12-31 至 2018-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/393711240?language=en
• 关键词: Effects; combined; climate; change; stressors

Anthropogenic climate change is already affecting the planet’s ecosystems, in particular the world’s oceans. Here, elevated temperatures, ocean acidification and deoxygenated or hypoxic areas affect, amongst other factors, the growth and survival of marine organisms. Against the backdrop of climate change, marine environments with stable conditions and less pronounced seasonal variability pose an increasing challenge for local organisms as their physiological tolerance thresholds are often less variable or already at their limits. Experimental approaches, simulating projected environmental scenarios, can help shed light on how these marine organisms modify metabolic processes, which are key to biological fitness, so they can cope with future and likely even more extreme conditions. However, there are only few studies testing the coupled effects of the three aforementioned stressors, especially with regard to marine fishes. Their population sizes are, next to fisheries, controlled by the recruitment and survival of their larvae which potentially increases the significance of climate-change affected environmental factors for population dynamics. Hence, the proposed project aims at investigating the interaction and effects of increased temperature, ocean acidification and hypoxia on eco-physiological parameters of the particularly vulnerable early life stages of coral reef fishes. Two sets of experiments will give insight in how larvae of the cinnamon clownfish (Amphiprion melanopus), a key species at the Great Barrier Reef (Australia), respond to projected and simulated environmental conditions. For this, the interaction between increased temperatures, ocean acidification and hypoxia will be investigated on metabolically relevant traits, including oxygen consumption rates, swimming performance, growth and condition, in individual fish. Then, further measurements including a gill structure and surface analysis, as well as aerobic and anaerobic metabolic enzyme activities will assist in completing the picture on how the organism is responding at the tissue and cellular levels. Both sets of experiments span the whole larval development – hatching to post-metamorphosis – to identify windows where fish may be most at risk and support a holistic understanding of how early life history is affected under near-future environmental conditions. This novel and comprehensive approach offers great potential for the conservation of marine fishes’ biodiversity. In addition, the project is promising for further research approaches using models to theoretically upscale the physiological results from an organismal to a population level. Such models could be applied to other systems as well, for example, commercial species from temperate latitudes where efforts are being made to support sustainable fisheries.

人为气候变化已经影响到地球的生态系统，特别是世界海洋。在这里，气温升高、海洋酸化和脱氧或缺氧区域等因素影响着海洋生物的生长和生存。在气候变化的背景下，条件稳定、季节变化不太明显的海洋环境对当地生物体构成了越来越大的挑战，因为它们的生理耐受阈值往往变化较小或已经达到极限。模拟预计环境情景的实验方法可以帮助揭示这些海洋生物如何改变代谢过程，这是生物适应性的关键，因此它们能够应对未来甚至可能更极端的条件。然而，只有很少的研究测试上述三种压力源的耦合效应，特别是对于海洋鱼类。除了渔业之外，它们的种群规模还受到幼虫的补充和生存的控制，这可能会增加气候变化影响的环境因素对种群动态的重要性。因此，拟议项目旨在研究温度升高、海洋酸化和缺氧对珊瑚礁鱼类特别脆弱的早期生命阶段的生态生理参数的相互作用和影响。两组实验将深入了解大堡礁（澳大利亚）的关键物种肉桂小丑鱼（Amphiprion melanopus）的幼虫如何对预测和模拟的环境条件做出反应。为此，将研究温度升高、海洋酸化和缺氧之间的相互作用，以研究个体鱼类的代谢相关特征，包括耗氧率、游泳性能、生长和状况。然后，进一步的测量，包括鳃结构和表面分析，以及有氧和无氧代谢酶活性，将有助于完整了解生物体在组织和细胞水平上如何反应。两组实验涵盖了整个幼体发育过程（孵化到变态后），以确定鱼类可能面临最大风险的窗口，并支持全面了解早期生活史在近期环境条件下如何受到影响。这种新颖而全面的方法为保护海洋鱼类的生物多样性提供了巨大的潜力。此外，该项目有望使用模型进一步研究方法，从理论上将生理结果从有机体水平升级到群体水平。这些模型也可以应用于其他系统，例如来自温带地区正在努力支持可持续渔业的商业物种。