Project: An Investigation of the Role of Nutrition in the Coral Calcification Response to Ocean Acidification

The project description is a modification of the original NSF award abstract.

This research project is part of the larger NSF funded CRI-OA collaborative research initiative and was funded as an Ocean Acidification-Category 1, 2010 award. Over the course of this century, all tropical coral reef ecosystems, whether fringing heavily populated coastlines or lining remote islands and atolls, face unprecedented threat from ocean acidification caused by rising levels of atmospheric CO2. In many laboratory experiments conducted to date, calcium carbonate production (calcification) by scleractinian (stony) corals showed an inverse correlation to seawater saturation state OMEGAar), whether OMEGAar was manipulated by acid or CO2 addition. Based on these data, it is predicted that coral calcification rates could decline by up to 80% of modern values by the end of this century. A growing body of new experimental data however, suggests that the coral calcification response to ocean acidification may be less straightforward and a lot more variable than previously recognized. In at least 10 recent experiments including our own, 8 different tropical and temperate species reared under nutritionally-replete but significantly elevated CO2 conditions (780-1200 ppm, OMEAGar ~1.5-2), continued to calcify at rates comparable to conspecifics reared under ambient CO2. These experimental results are consistent with initial field data collected on reefs in the eastern Pacific and southern Oman, where corals today live and accrete their skeletons under conditions equivalent to 2X and 3X pre-industrial CO2. On these high CO2, high nutrient reefs (where nitrate concentrations typically exceed 2.5 micro-molar), coral growth rates rival, and sometimes even exceed, those of conspecifics in low CO2, oligotrophic reef environments.

The investigators propose that a coral's energetic status, tightly coupled to the availability of inorganic nutrients and/or food, is a key factor in the calcification response to CO2-induced ocean acidification. Their hypothesis, if confirmed by the proposed laboratory investigations, implies that predicted changes in coastal and open ocean nutrient concentrations over the course of this century, driven by both climate impacts on ocean stratification and by increased human activity in coastal regions, could play a critical role in exacerbating and in some areas, modulating the coral reef response to ocean acidification. This research program builds on the investigators initial results and observations. The planned laboratory experiments will test the hypothesis that: (1) The coral calcification response to ocean acidification is linked to the energetic status of the coral host. The relative contribution of symbiont photosynthesis and heterotrophic feeding to a coral's energetic status varies amongst species. Enhancing the energetic status of corals reared under high CO2, either by stimulating photosynthesis with inorganic nutrients or by direct heterotrophic feeding of the host lowers the sensitivity of calcification to decreased seawater OMEGAar; (2) A species-specific threshold CO2 level exists over which enhanced energetic status can no longer compensate for decreased OMEGAar of the external seawater. Similarly, we will test the hypothesis that a nutrient threshold exists over which nutrients become detrimental for calcification even under high CO2 conditions; and (3) Temperature-induced reduction of algal symbionts is one stressor that can reduce the energetic reserve of the coral host and exacerbate the calcification response to ocean acidification.

The investigator's initial findings highlight the critical importance of energetic status in the coral calcification response to ocean acidification. Verification of these findings in the laboratory, and identification of nutrient and CO2 thresholds for a range of species will have immediate, direct impact on predictions of reef resilience in a high CO2 world. The research project brings together a diverse group of expertise in coral biogeochemistry, chemical oceanography, molecular biology and coral reproductive ecology to focus on a problem that has enormous societal, economic and conservation relevance.