Impact of predicted climate change scenarios on a coral reef meiofauna community

Abstract

Changes in marine communities in response to elevated CO2 have been reported but information on how representatives of the benthic lower trophic levels will be impacted remains scarce. A laboratory experiment was conducted to evaluate the impact of different climate change scenarios on a coral reef meiofauna community. Samples of the meiofauna community were collected from the coral reef subtidal zone of Serrambi beach (Ipojuca, Pernambuco, Brazil), using artificial substrate units. The units were exposed to control treatments and to three climate change scenarios, and collected after 15 and 29 d. Important changes in the meiofauna community structure were observed after 15 d of exposure. The major meiofauna groups exhibited divergent responses to the various scenarios. Although polychaetes were negatively affected after 29 d in the most severe scenario (Scenario III), harpacticoid copepods were negatively affected in Scenarios II and III after 15 and 29 d. Harpacticoid nauplii were strongly and negatively affected in all scenarios. In contrast, Nematoda exhibited higher densities in all scenarios. To the best of our knowledge, this community-based study was the first to observe how meiofauna organisms from a coral reef environment react to the synergetic effects of reductions in seawater pH and increased temperature.

Altered sediment biota and lagoon habitat carbonate dynamics due to sea cucumber bioturbation in a high‐pCO2 environment

“…Strong community‐based shifts in the species composition of benthic sediment systems can be driven by decreased seawater pH (Alsterberg et al., ; Fabricius et al., ; Kroeker et al., ; Sarmento et al., , ; Widdicombe et al., ). Infaunal amphipods and ostracods were more abundant in elevated p CO 2 mesocosms, as shown previously (Kroeker et al., ; Sarmento et al., ).…”

“…As global seawater pH continues to decline, calcification by corals—the primary ecosystem providers—will become increasingly difficult (Albright et al., ; Andersson & Gledhill, ; Dove et al., ; Hoegh‐Guldberg et al., ; Shaw, Phinn, Tilbrook, & Steven, ). As shown in field (Albright et al., ; Shamberger et al., ; Shaw et al., ; Silverman et al., ) and mesocosm (Alsterberg, Eklöf, Gamfeldt, Havenhand, & Sundbäck, ; Dove et al., ; Page et al., ; Sarmento, Pinheiro, Montes, & Santos, ; Sarmento, Souza, Esteves, & Santos, ) studies, significant changes to reef chemistry, structure and benthic communities are already occurring with further negative prospects for reef resilience expected for the coming decades (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC], ; Spalding & Brown, ). Predicting the impacts of changing ocean conditions on marine ecosystems requires a better understanding of community–habitat interactions, and the potential for compensatory mechanisms through ecological interactions to resist deleterious regime shifts in a future ocean (Alsterberg et al., ; Anthony, Diaz‐Pulido, Verlinden, Tilbrook, & Andersson, ; Dove et al., ; Ghedini, Russell, & Connell, ; Kleypas, Anthony, & Gattuso, ; Kroeker, Micheli, Gambi, & Martz, ; Nagelkerken & Munday, ; Page et al., ; Vinebrooke et al., ).…”

“…Some species of meiofauna with poorly calcified exoskeletons (e.g. amphipods, polychaetes, nematodes) are not greatly affected by reduced pH since they are less dependent on the availability of calcium carbonate minerals than more heavily calcified species (Cigliano, Gambi, Rodolfo‐Metalpa, Patti, & Hall‐Spencer, ; Hale, Calosi, McNeill, Mieszkowska, & Widdicombe, ; Kroeker et al., ; Kurihara, Ishimatsu, & Shirayama, ; Sarmento et al., , ; Whiteley, ). Thus, ocean acidification will likely drive shifts in the community composition of meiofauna, thereby simplifying benthic food webs and impacting trophic functioning (Alsterberg et al., ; Dashfield, Somerfield, Widdicombe, Austen, & Nimmo, ; Kroeker et al., ; Kurihara et al., ; Sarmento et al., , ; Widdicombe et al., ).…”

Anthropogenic Impacts on Coral Reef Harpacticoid Copepods

“…The ASUs selected for this study were rectangles of 10 × 5 cm synthetic grass that adequately mimic the turf algae environment and have been used in experimental laboratory studies investigating the anthropogenic impacts on meiofauna communities in reef environments [9,46].…”

Los poliquetos como indicadores biológicos en Latinoamérica y el Caribe

“…Experimentos manipulativos de campo (Faraco y Lana 2003, Mayer-Pinto y Junqueira 2003Gandra et al 2006;Botter-Carvalho et al 2011) y de laboratorio (Silva et al 2013;Sarmento et al 2017) demostraron la resiliencia de L. acuta y de otras especies de las familias Nereididae, Goniadidae, Nephytidae y Pilargidae en situaciones de estrés súbitos. La tolerancia y la rápida tasa de recolonización fue constatada durante la exposición a diesel (Faraco y Lana 2003;Gandra et al 2006;Egres et al 2012), a toxinas de algas (Silva et al 2013), en simulaciones de hipóxia y anóxia (Botter-Carvalho et al 2011) y de cambios climáticos (Sarmento et al 2017). Además de estas familias, los Spionidae también revelaron su papel bioindicador por la formación de tubos mucosos cuando fueron transplantados a áreas poluídas (Mayer-Pinto y Junqueira 2003).…”