Data compilation on the biological response to ocean acidification: environmental and experimental context of data sets and related literature

The exponential growth of studies on the biological response to ocean acidification over the last few decades has generated a large amount of data. To facilitate data comparison, a data compilation hosted at the data publisher PANGAEA was initiated in 2008 and is updated on a regular basis (doi:10.1594/PANGAEA.149999). By January 2015, a total of 581 data sets (over 4 000 000 data points) from 539 papers had been archived. Here we present the developments of this data compilation five years since its first description by Nisumaa et al. (2010). Most of study sites from which data archived are still in the Northern Hemisphere and the number of archived data from studies from the Southern Hemisphere and polar oceans are still relatively low. Data from 60 studies that investigated the response of a mix of organisms or natural communities were all added after 2010, indicating a welcomed shift from the study of individual organisms to communities and ecosystems. The initial imbalance of considerably more data archived on calcification and primary production than on other processes has improved. There is also a clear tendency towards more data archived from multifactorial studies after 2010. For easier and more effective access to ocean acidification data, the ocean acidification community is strongly encouraged to contribute to the data archiving effort, and help develop standard vocabularies describing the variables and define best practices for archiving ocean acidification data.

Culture conditions, mass spectrometric measurements and acclimation carbonate chemistry

- A combined increase in seawater [CO2] and [H+] was recently shown to induce a shift from photosynthetic HCO3- to CO2 uptake in Emiliania huxleyi. This shift occurred within minutes, whereas acclimation to ocean acidification (OA) did not affect the carbon source. - To identify the driver of this shift, we exposed low- and high-light acclimated E. huxleyi to a matrix of two levels of dissolved inorganic carbon (1400, 2800 lmol kg-1) and pH (8.15, 7.85) and directly measured cellular O2, CO2 and HCO3 fluxes under these conditions. - Exposure to increased [CO2] had little effect on the photosynthetic fluxes, whereas increased [H+] led to a significant decline in HCO3- uptake. Low-light acclimated cells overcompensated for the inhibition of HCO3- uptake by increasing CO2 uptake. High-light acclimated cells, relying on higher proportions of HCO3- uptake, could not increase CO2 uptake and photosynthetic O2 evolution consequently became carbon-limited. - These regulations indicate that OA responses in photosynthesis are caused by [H+] rather than by [CO2]. The impaired HCO3- uptake also provides a mechanistic explanation for lowered calcification under OA. Moreover, it explains the OA-dependent decrease in photosynthesis observed in high-light grown phytoplankton.

Seawater carbonate chemistry, mass, length and gene expression of Sepia officinalis during experiments, 2011

The specific transporters involved in maintenance of blood pH homeostasis in cephalopod molluscs have not been identified to date. Using in situ hybridization and immuno histochemical methods, we demonstrate that Na+/K+-ATPase (soNKA), a V-type H+-ATPase (soV-HA), and Na+/HCO3- cotransporter (soNBC) are co-localized in NKA-rich cells in the gills of Sepia officinalis. mRNA expression patterns of these transporters and selected metabolic genes were examined in response to moderately elevated seawater pCO2 (0.16 and 0.35 kPa) over a time-course of six weeks in different ontogenetic stages. The applied CO2 concentrations are relevant for ocean acidification scenarios projected for the coming decades. We determined strong expression changes in late stage embryos and hatchlings, with one to three log2-fold reductions in soNKA, soNBCe, socCAII and COX. In contrast, no hypercapnia induced changes in mRNA expression were observed in juveniles during both short- and long-term exposure. However a transiently increased demand of ion regulatory demand was evident during the initial acclimation reaction to elevated seawater pCO2. Gill Na+/K+-ATPase activity and protein concentration were increased by approximately 15% in during short (2-11 day), but not long term (42 day) exposure. Our findings support the hypothesis that the energy budget of adult cephalopods is not significantly compromised during long-term exposure to moderate environmental hypercapnia. However, the down regulation of ion-regulatory and metabolic genes in late stage embryos, taken together with a significant reduction in somatic growth, indicates that cephalopod early life stages are challenged by elevated seawater pCO2.