CR2
Find us on
  • Home
  • About Us
  • Calendar
  • Classes
    • Fall 2012 Classes >
      • Reef Biology
      • Caribbean History
    • Spring 2013 Classes >
      • The Age of U. S. Imperialism
      • CR2: Coral Reefs on Camera
    • Marine Biology (Spring 2014)
    • Related Classes
  • Shedd Aquarium
    • Labs at the Shedd Aquarium
    • Underwater Robotics Club
  • With Every Drop

Algae as the coal mine-canary of the Pacific NW

1/26/2014

0 Comments

 
Picture
Above is a photo of University of Chicago graduate student Sophie McCoy, studying algal biodiversity in Washington. It's not the sodden, green-brown macroalgae blanketing the rocks McCoy is concerned with – she's looking at crustose coralline algae, species of algae that actually put down calcium carbonate skeletons:
Picture
Pseudolithophyllum muricatum, the species McCoy is studying as a bellwether of the health of coastal ecosystems in Tatoosh Island, Washington. Note the genus name: Pseudolitho ("false rock") + phyllum ("plant", or "leaf").
Calcareous coralline algae are red algae (Rhodophytes) in the order Corallinales. As a creative Wikipedia author puts it, coralline algae with rocks and coral skeletons as substrata look like patches of paint "splashed as though by a mad painter over rock surfaces". Some coralline algae in tropical seas is epizoic (grows on animals) or epiphytic (grows on other plants). Occasionally, other (non-calcified) algae grows in and on coralline algae, particularly in warm waters; many coralline algae shed their epithallus (the outer layer of their "body", or thallus) to shake off these unwelcome guests. There are two types (not phylogenetically distinct) of coralline algae: branching, geniculate algae and crustose, flat algae like the ones McCoy is studying.

Coralline algae have an important hermatypic (reef-building) purpose in coral reef communities, but perhaps the most important ecological role coralline algae fill is providing a microhabitat for the larvae of molluscs, echinoderms, and other herbivorous marine invertebrates. On the rocky coasts in the northwest Atlantic, for example, the larvae of sea urchins, chitons and limpets rely heavily on the calcareous microstructures of coralline algae as a refuge from predators and suffer 100% mortality without their presence. Coralline algae also serves as an important food source for some of those invertebrates once they reach adulthood.

The lives of coralline algae (and the lives of their invertebrate larvae-partners) revolve around even the most minute changes in marine chemistry, and in communities with several similar sympatric, competing species of coralline algae, changes in diversity and relative abundance can be indicators that something greater is amiss. McCoy's research has revealed that Pseudolithophyllum muricatum, once the dominant species of coralline algae in Tatoosh Island, now has only a 25% success rate over competitors. McCoy explains that P. muricatum is losing out because it produces more calcium carbonate than its competitors:
“Some species are more affected than others. So the ones that need to make more calcium carbonate tissue, like P. muricatum, are under more stress than the ones that don’t.”
Bottom line: from the waters off Tatoosh Island to the Caribbean Sea, ocean acidification is a universal problem. It's increasingly becoming a fact of life for ocean species, and it will only accelerate as humans continue increasing atmospheric carbon concentrations. 

Learn more about Sophie McCoy's research here.

Author: Matthew
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Welcome

    With Every Drop is a Chicago-based blog, published by CR² team members, that focuses on the biodiversity, ecology, and conservation of marine and freshwater ecosystems.  

    “Even if you never have the chance to see or touch the ocean, the ocean touches you with every breath you take, every drop of water you drink, every bite you consume. Everyone, everywhere is inextricably connected to and utterly dependent upon the existence of the sea.” – Dr. Sylvia Earle 

    Archives

    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    October 2014
    August 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    August 2012

    Categories

    All
    Adopt-a-Beach
    Cephalopod Of The Week
    Demotivational
    Digital Dispatch
    Dominican Republic Trip
    General
    Underwater Robotics
    Week 1: Squid Anatomy
    Week 2: Mission Marine Habitat
    Week 3: Corals
    Week 4: Fish Pathology
    Week 5: Lakeshore Biology
    Xkcd

    RSS Feed


    Large Visitor Globe
Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.