Publication Date:
2022-05-27
Description:
Author Posting. © Company of Biologists, 2021. This article is posted here by permission of Company of Biologists for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of Experimental Biology 224(5), (2021): jeb236745, https://doi.org/10.1242/jeb.236745.
Description:
Parental effects can prepare offspring for different environments and facilitate survival across generations. We exposed parental populations of the estuarine anemone, Nematostella vectensis, from Massachusetts to elevated temperatures and quantified larval mortality across a temperature gradient. We found that parental exposure to elevated temperatures resulted in a consistent increase in larval thermal tolerance, as measured by the temperature at which 50% of larvae die (LT50), with a mean increase in LT50 of 0.3°C. Larvae from subsequent spawns returned to baseline thermal thresholds when parents were returned to normal temperatures, indicating plasticity in these parental effects. Histological analyses of gametogenesis in females suggested that these dynamic shifts in larval thermal tolerance may be facilitated by maternal effects in non-overlapping gametic cohorts. We also compared larvae from North Carolina (a genetically distinct population with higher baseline thermal tolerance) and Massachusetts parents, and observed that larvae from heat-exposed Massachusetts parents had thermal thresholds comparable to those of larvae from unexposed North Carolina parents. North Carolina parents also increased larval thermal tolerance under the same high-temperature regime, suggesting that plasticity in parental effects is an inherent trait for N. vectensis. Overall, we find that larval thermal tolerance in N. vectensis shows a strong genetic basis and can be modulated by parental effects. Further understanding of the mechanisms behind these shifts can elucidate the fate of thermally sensitive ectotherms in a rapidly changing thermal environment.
Description:
The Betty and Gordon Moore Foundation [4598 to A.M.T.] provided funding for this work. Additional funding for H.E.R. was provided by the National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship Program, Gates Millennium Scholars Program, the Martin Family Fellowship for Sustainability and the American Association of University Women. C.-Y.C. and M.C.G. were funded by the Stowers Institute for Medical Research.
Description:
2022-03-11
Keywords:
Acclimation
;
Cnidaria
;
LT50
;
Maternal effects
;
Paternal effects
;
Thermal limits
Repository Name:
Woods Hole Open Access Server
Type:
Article
