Future too warm for baby sharks
New research has found as climate change causes the world’s oceans to warm, baby sharks are born smaller, exhausted, undernourished and into environments that are already difficult for them to survi
ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies
James Cook University Townsville
Queensland 4811 Australia
Phone: 61 7 4781 4000
Email: info@coralcoe.org.au
Abstract. Coral-associated bacteria have been proposed to provide important functions in promoting corals’ success by enhancing nutrition, enabling nutrient cycling and providing resistance against diseases. While coral microbiome research is increasing, we still have a limited understanding of the bacterial community structure and role in coral species and reefs. This research compares the bacterial assemblages in various coral species, environments and stress conditions to describe their variability and persistence, and to provide a roadmap to guide focused studies investigating bacterial function in corals. In healthy corals, bacteria’s diversity reaches 10’s of thousands of distinct phylotypes. Each coral species is found to have distinct bacterial composition, and these respond in synchronicity to changes across spatial scales and depths. Alpha- and Gammaproteobacteria are the most common bacterial classes and some bacteria are consistently found across coral species and reef habitats, for example, one phylotype of the family Alteromonadaceae was found in 98.4% of all coral samples. Bacterial assemblages in severely bleached corals are different to those described in healthy corals. In bleached corals, Alpha- and Gammaproteobacteria are diminished, and conversely rare bacterial species increase, thus disrupting the normal symbiotic taxonomical structure observed in healthy corals. I propose to dissect the coral microbiome in three distinct microbial sub-groups: a ubiquitous core microbiome of very few symbiotic bacteria; an environmentally responsive microbiome of phylotypes reef- and taxa-specific; and a highly variable transient community. This research contributes to the understanding of the coral microbiome structure and function, and presents key knowledge to decipher the response of coral holobiont to future anthropogenic stressors and the identification of bacterial key species.
Biography. Alejandra is an awardee of the Australia Awards Scholarship, pursuing a PhD in the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reefs Studies, James Cook University. She is interested in coral microbial ecology, and microbial contributions to coral success and functioning. To investigate these topics, Alejandra is exploring bacterial communities in diverse coral species along different environments in the Great Barrier Reef and the Coral Sea. As part of her research she is exploring approaches employed at other complex bacterial-host systems where microbial contributions have been well-established to propose and test hypotheses about the bacterial role in corals, while disentangling its complexity.
New research has found as climate change causes the world’s oceans to warm, baby sharks are born smaller, exhausted, undernourished and into environments that are already difficult for them to survi
A new study shows the coastal protection coral reefs currently provide will start eroding by the end of the century, as the world continues to warm and the oceans acidify. A team of researchers led
A team of scientists led by the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies (Coral CoE) won one of the nation’s top science awards at tonight’s ‘Oscars of Australian science’, the Eureka P
An analytical tool will be used to assess the climate risks facing historic World Heritage sites in Africa—the ruins of two great 13th century ports and the remains of a palace and iron-making indus
Abstract: It is a little over a decade since research commenced into the effects of anthropogenic ocean acidification on marine fishes. In that time, we have learned that projected end-of-century
Abstract: Increased uptake of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere has caused the world’s ocean to become more acidic. Different marine habitats are known to have varying ranges of CO2 across mul
Abstract: The Allen Coral Atlas (http://allencoralatlas.org) partnership uses high-resolution satellite imagery, machine learning, and field data to map and monitor the world’s coral reefs at unp
Abstract: Climate change is causing the average surface temperature of the oceans to rise and increasing the frequency and intensity of marine heatwaves. In addition, absorption of additional CO2
Abstract: Marine environments are a concealing medium, where observations of natural fish behavior are challenging. In particular, the geographic and depth distributions of migratory top predators ar
Abstract: Invasive species management can be the the subject of debate in many countries due to conflicting ecological, ethical, economic, and social reasons, especially when dealing with a species s
Abstract: Ocean acidification, the increase in seawater CO2 with all its associated consequences, is relatively well understood in open oceans. In shelf seas such as the Great Barrier Reef, processe
Abstract: The backdrop of legends and movies, the deep sea has always been unfathomable because we had no idea what existed there. Once thought to be barren of life, we now know this couldn’t be
ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies
James Cook University Townsville
Queensland 4811 Australia
Phone: 61 7 4781 4000
Email: info@coralcoe.org.au