SEMINAR: MBF602 9/30/11 S/A 103, 1:00pm Erica Towle: Heterotrophic feeding in corals may account for resilience in the face of global climate change stressors

["Maxine Williams" <mwilliams@rsmas.miami.edu>]

MBF602 9/30/11 S/A 103, 1:00pm Student Speaker Erica Towle

 

Heterotrophic feeding in corals may account for resilience in the face of global climate change stressors

 

 

Heterotrophy in corals may promote resilience to climate change. Scleractinian corals host autotrophic symbionts that provide them with food. Some corals rely solely on their symbionts while others supplement their nutrition via heterotrophy. Feeding rates of corals appear to be plastic and vary with environmental changes such as ocean acidification, the decrease in ocean pH resulting from uptake of atmospheric carbon dioxide. As pH declines, the availability of carbonate ion decreases, retarding calcification. Enhanced feeding may mitigate acidification stress by providing corals with extra energy to facilitate the calcium/hydrogen pump required for calcification. Certain species may be more capable of feeding than others, and such species-specific differences may play a key role in determining resilience. Discovering which corals will be resilient to acidification will allow prediction of what Florida reefs of the future will look like and which species in other regions may have the same heterotrophic abilities. This research will examine the relative contributions of heterotrophy for corals in the Florida Reef Tract, how nutritional status affects lipid stores, and whether there is a correlation between feeding rates, lipid stores, and resilience. I hypothesize that corals that can effectively use heterotrophy will exhibit greater energy reserves and demonstrate greater resilience to acidification, as determined by calcification. 

 

 

 

Erica Towle

B.S. in Marine and Atmospheric Science, University of Miami, 2010

Entered Ph.D. program Fall 2010

Advisor: Chris Langdon