Date

Summer 2021

Document Type

Master's Thesis (Open Access)

Degree Name

Master of Science (M.S.)

Department

Moss Landing Marine Laboratories

Abstract

Phenotypic plasticity is one way that species may cope with stressful environmental changes associated with climate change. Reef building corals present a good model for studying phenotypic plasticity because they have experienced rapid climate-driven declines in the past thirty years, often with differential survival among individuals during heat stress. One potential reason for underlying differences in thermotolerance may be due to differences in baseline levels of environmental stress. Stress associated with pollution has been shown to produce synergistic effects with heat stress, exacerbating the physiological damage of heat stress. Conversely, it is possible that mild pollution stress could prepare corals to better cope with heat stress via cross tolerance mechanisms. Cross tolerance occurs when a mild stressor prepares an organism for more extreme, subsequent stress, reducing the impact of that stressor on the organism. To examine these two possibilities, acute heat stress experiments were conducted on Acropora hyacinthus from five sites around Tutuila, American Samoa with differing pollution impact. Bleaching responses were measured visually, using photographic assessment to estimate chlorophyll content, and using pulse amplitude fluorometry to measure photosynthetic efficiency. Endosymbiont community composition was assessed at each site using quantitative PCR. RNA sequencing was used to compare differences in genes expression patterns prior to and during heat stress. Symbiont communities differed among sites, with heat tolerant Durusdinium dominating in areas with higher pollution impact and heat sensitive Cladocopium relatively more common in pristine areas. Pollution stress may induce a shift towards Durusdinium thereby enhancing resistance to subsequent heat stress in the near term. Gene expression patterns showed few differences correlating to site or pollution level. Thermotolerance, however, did correlate with gene expression patterns, both during heat stress and under control conditions. In this thesis, I present potential mechanisms underlying coral thermal tolerance in pollution-impacted areas. Our results highlight the importance of measuring pollution impacts on thermotolerance and identifying heat tolerant corals in “non-pristine” areas and their potential to seed nearby reefs following bleaching events.

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