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AbstractOxygen bioavailability is declining in aquatic systems worldwide as a result of climate change and other anthropogenic stressors. For aquatic organisms, the consequences are poorly known but are likely to reflect both direct effects of declining oxygen bioavailability and interactions between oxygen and other stressors, including two-warming and acidification-that have received substantial attention in recent decades and that typically accompany oxygen changes. Drawing on the collected papers in this symposium volume ("An Oxygen Perspective on Climate Change"), we outline the causes and consequences of declining oxygen bioavailability. First, we discuss the scope of natural and predicted anthropogenic changes in aquatic oxygen levels. Although modern organisms are the result of long evolutionary histories during which they were exposed to natural oxygen regimes, anthropogenic change is now exposing them to more extreme conditions and novel combinations of low oxygen with other stressors. Second, we identify behavioral and physiological mechanisms that underlie the interactive effects of oxygen with other stressors, and we assess the range of potential organismal responses to oxygen limitation that occur across levels of biological organization and over multiple timescales. We argue that metabolism and energetics provide a powerful and unifying framework for understanding organism-oxygen interactions. Third, we conclude by outlining a set of approaches for maximizing the effectiveness of future work, including focusing on long-term experiments using biologically realistic variation in experimental factors and taking truly cross-disciplinary and integrative approaches to understanding and predicting future effects.

Land use and land cover (LULC) can significantly alter river water, which can in turn have important impacts on downstream coastal ecosystems by delivering nutrients that promote marine eutrophication and hypoxia. Well-documented in temperate systems, less is known about the way land cover relates to water quality in low-lying coastal zones in the tropics. Here we evaluate the catchment LULC and the physical and chemical characteristics of six rivers that contribute flow into a seasonally hypoxic tropical bay in Bocas del Toro, Panama. From July 2019 to March 2020, we routinely surveyed eight physical and chemical characteristics (temperature, specific conductivity, salinity, pH, dissolved oxygen (DO), nitrate and nitrite, ammonium, and phosphate). Our goals were to determine how these physical and chemical characteristics of the rivers reflect the LULC, to compare the water quality of the focal rivers to rivers across Panama, and to discuss the potential impacts of river discharge in the Bay. Overall, we found that the six focal rivers have significantly different river water characteristics that can be linked to catchment LULC and that water quality of rivers 10 s of kilometers apart could differ drastically. Two focal catchments dominated by pristine peat swamp vegetation in San San Pond Sak, showed characteristics typical of blackwater rivers, with low pH, dissolved oxygen, and nutrients. The remaining four catchments were largely mountainous with >50% forest cover. In these rivers, variation in nutrient concentrations were associated with percent urbanization. Comparisons across Panamanian rivers covered in a national survey to our focal rivers shows that saltwater intrusions and low DO of coastal swamp rivers may result in their classification by a standardized water quality index as having slightly contaminated water quality, despite this being their natural state. Examination of deforestation over the last 20 years, show that changes were

Broadly distributed species need to perform well in a range of environmental conditions, but knowledge of how wide‐ranging marine larvae perform along latitudinal gradients remains limited. The fatty acid composition of larvae is important for their physiological responses to changing conditions. Here, we investigated the fatty acid composition of the last, non‐feeding stage of barnacle larvae (cyprids) using an integrative (larvae–environment) and comparative (latitudinal) approach. We measured fatty acids in the pelagic particulate matter and cyprids from Chthamalus bisinuatus, Chthamalus proteus, and Semibalanus balanoides from tropical to polar (Arctic) latitudes to identify potential food sources during the feeding larval stages (nauplius) that precede the cyprids and to ascertain larval capacity to integrate neutral (energetic) and polar (structural) fatty acids. We demonstrate that particulate matter in tropical waters mainly consisted of low‐quality saturated fatty acids derived from detrital pathways, while particulate matter from polar waters was rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids originating from living microalgae. Across the studied regions, neutral fatty acids were assimilated from various food sources including diatoms, dinoflagellates, detritus, and microeukaryotes. Cyprids consistently retained higher essential fatty acid levels than the relative share in the particulate matter. Particularly, the essential docosahexaenoic acid (22:6ω3), which was scarce in the particulate matter, was highly retained across all species but highest for the tropical cyprids. We argue that this latitudinal pattern in fatty acid retention is related to periods of reduced nutrient intake, increased energetic and/or synthetic requirements, and responses to physical large‐scale differences in environmental conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ocean Sampling Day was initiated by the EU-funded Micro B3 (Marine Microbial Biodiversity, Bioinformatics, Biotechnology) project to obtain a snapshot of the marine microbial biodiversity and function of the world's oceans. It is a simultaneous global mega-sequencing campaign aiming to generate the largest standardized microbial data set in a single day. This will be achievable only through the coordinated efforts of an Ocean Sampling Day Consortium, supportive partnerships and networks between sites. This commentary outlines the establishment, function and aims of the Consortium and describes our vision for a sustainable study of marine microbial communities and their embedded functional traits.

Abstract. Chemical signaling, especially signaling with waterborne cues, is an important mode of communication between conspecifics of aquatic organisms. Although conspecific associations play an important role in sex allocation of [...]

. A modification of a semi-quantitative colorbased enzyme assay was used to quantify the activity of 19 enzymes (5 peptidases, 3 lipases, 3 phosphotases, and 8 carbohydrases) during five stages of development in eight species of calyptraeid gastropods. Sixteen of the 19 enzymes showed a significant effect of mode of development on the concentration of the reaction product after incubation of homogenates standardized for protein content. The overall pattern was that planktotrophs showed the highest activities, followed by adelphophages, and nonfeeding embryos, which had the lowest enzyme activities. Thirteen enzymes showed significant differences across developmental stages. Of these, eight showed a clear increase during development. Only one of the enzymes showed a sudden jump in activity between the unfed, pre-hatching stage and post-hatching stages that were fed Isochrysis galbana. In three cases, ANOVA identified two exclusive, significantly different groups of species. In naphthol-AS-BI-phosphohydrolase, the measured absorbance of Crucibulum spinosum samples was significantly higher than in all of the other species. The activity of α-fucosidase in Crepipatella occulta was significantly greater than in the other seven species. Finally, the activity of β-galactosidase was significantly higher in occulta. Crucibulum spinosum, and Bostrycapulus calyptraeformis than in the four Crepidula species. This is the only enzyme for which there is an indication of a phylogenetic effect. Relative enzyme activities were similar to those reported for other herbivorous gastropods, with the three phosphohydrolases, four carbohydrases (β-galactosidase, β-glucuronidase, N-acetyl-β-glucosaminidase, and α-fucosidase), and leucine arylamidase showing high activities., Introduction From the perspective of energetics, marine invertebrates can be roughly divided into those that have feeding, planktonic larvae (planktotrophic development) and those that do not (referred to here as [...]

Adelphophagic development, where embryos consume sibling embryos or nurse eggs, is particularly common in marine caenogastropods and some families of polychaetes. When exogenous nutrition is provided before hatching, egg size and hatching size can be uncoupled, but advantages and constraints of adelphophagic development compared to development from large eggs are unknown. Here we examine temperature-mediated plasticity in offspring size, brooding duration, and fecundity in the adelphophagic marine gastropod Crepidula cf. onyx. We use these data combined with previously published data on two planktotrophic Crepidula and two Crepidula species that develop from large eggs to test hypotheses about the consequences of adelphophagic development and patterns of variation in offspring size. In Crepidula cf. onyx, egg size shows no significant effect of temperature. Hatching size is significantly larger at 28 °C than at 23 °C but proceeds from fewer eggs per capsule at 28 °C. Hatching size is therefore decoupled from both egg size and the number of eggs per capsule. Although development is faster at the higher temperature, broods are produced roughly every 26-27 days at both temperatures. Increased rate of development has been cited as a potential advantage of adelphophagic development in muricids, but the adelphophagic C. cf. onyx did not develop more quickly than C. atrasolea or C. ustulatulina, species that produce similarly sized hatchlings from large eggs. Comparisons across calyptraeid species support the role of adelphophagy in increasing variance in offspring size. This increased variability is primarily expressed within broods or among broods from the same female, not among females., Introduction Marine invertebrates have evolved a number of ways for small eggs packaged by mothers into gelatinous egg masses or capsules to develop into large hatchlings. For example, in volutid [...]

Recent developmental and genomic research focused on 'slipper snails' in the genus Crepidula has positioned Crepidula fornicata as a de facto model system for lophotrochozoan development. Here we review recent developments, as well as earlier reports demonstrating the widespread use of this system in studies of development and life history. Recent studies have resulted in a well-resolved fate map of embryonic cell lineage, documented mechanisms for axis determination and D quadrant specification, preliminary gene expression patterns, and the successful application of loss-and gain-of-function assays. The recent development of expressed sequence tags and preliminary genomics work will promote the use of this system, particularly in the area of developmental biology. A wealth of comparative information on phylogenetic relationships, variation in mode of development within the family, and numerous studies on larval biology and metamorphosis, primarily in Crepidula fornicata, make these snails a powerful tool for studies of the evolution of the mechanisms of development in the Mollusca and Lophotrochozoa. By bringing a review of the current state of knowledge of Crepidula life histories and development together with some detailed experimental methods, we hope to encourage further use of this system in various fields of investigation., Introduction The Lophotrochozoa is one of the largest clades of metazoans and includes the greatest diversity of adult body plans in any of the three major metazoan superclades (Halanych et [...]

Evolutionary transitions between different modes of development in marine invertebrates are thought to be biased toward the loss of feeding larvae. Because the morphology of feeding larvae is complex and nonfeeding larvae or encapsulated embryos with benthic development often have simplified morphologies, it is presumed to be easier to lose a larval stage than to reacquire it. Some authors have gone so far as to suggest that feeding larvae, morphologically similar to the ancestral feeding larvae, cannot be reacquired. However, the larval structures of some groups, most notably gastropods, are often retained in the encapsulated embryos of species that hatch as benthic juveniles. Therefore the re-evolution of feeding larvae using the same structures may be possible in these groups. Here we present the first well-substantiated case for the recent re-evolution of feeding larvae within a clade of direct-developers. DNA sequence data show that Crepipatella fecunda, a species of calyptraeid gastropod with planktotrophic development, is nested within a clade of species with direct development, and that Crepipatella dilatata, a species with direct development, appears to be paraphyletic with respect to C. fecunda. Observation of the embryos of C. dilatata shows that the features necessary for larval feeding and swimming are retained in the encapsulated veligers, suggesting that heterochronic shifts in hatching time and changes in nurse-egg allotment could have resulted in the re-evolution of feeding larvae in this species., Introduction The mode of development of marine invertebrates (direct or indirect, brooded, encapsulated, or planktonic) has far-reaching evolutionary and ecological consequences that are mediated via differences in dispersal ability. Species [...]

Data from 27 populations of 19 species of calyptraeid gastropods are collected to evaluate three predictions of sex change theory and compare the patterns observed in the monophyletic family with those of a compilation of animals from the literature Results reveal that information about individual groupings should be included in predictions of life-history theory and more information about the relationship between male fitness and size are also needed.

Fluctuating asymmetry (FA), defined as the distribution of small random deviations from bilateral symmetry in a sample of organisms, has received considerable attention in recent evolutionary and behavioral literature (Markow [...]