title: Phytoplankton cell size reduction in response to warming mediated by nutrient limitation.
abstract: Shrinking of body size has been proposed as one of the universal responses of organisms to global climate warming. Using phytoplankton as an experimental model system has supported the negative effect of warming on body-size, but it remains controversial whether the size reduction under increasing temperatures is a direct temperature effect or an indirect effect mediated over changes in size selective grazing or enhanced nutrient limitation which should favor smaller cell-sizes. Here we present an experiment with a factorial combination of temperature and nutrient stress which shows that most of the temperature effects on phytoplankton cell size are mediated via nutrient stress. This was found both for community mean cell size and for the cell sizes of most species analyzed. At the highest level of nutrient stress, community mean cell size decreased by 46% per °C, while it decreased only by 4.7% at the lowest level of nutrient stress. Individual species showed qualitatively the same trend, but shrinkage per °C was smaller. Overall, our results support the hypothesis that temperature effects on cell size are to a great extent mediated by nutrient limitation. This effect is expected to be exacerbated under field conditions, where higher temperatures of the surface waters reduce the vertical nutrient transport.
authors.affiliation: GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Kiel, Germany.
authors.forename: Kalista Higini
authors.initials: KH
authors.lastname: Peter
authors.forename: Ulrich
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Sommer
mesh_terms: D048429:Cell Size; D057232:Global Warming; D009589:Nitrogen Oxides / Q000378:metabolism; D009747:Nutritional Physiological Phenomena; D010710:Phosphates / Q000378:metabolism; D010839:Phytoplankton / Q000166:cytology* / Q000502:physiology; D012825:Silicon / Q000378:metabolism; D013312:Stress, Physiological; D013696:Temperature
chemical_list: D009589:Nitrogen Oxides; D010710:Phosphates; C031701:nitrogen trioxide; D012825:Silicon
references.citation: Proc Biol Sci. 2003 Dec 22;270(1533):2605-11
references.pmid: 14728784
references.citation: Trends Ecol Evol. 2011 Jun;26(6):285-91
references.pmid: 21470708
references.citation: Ecology. 2009 Feb;90(2):388-98
references.pmid: 19323223
references.citation: Science. 2002 Aug 30;297(5586):1545-8
references.pmid: 12202828
references.citation: PLoS One. 2012;7(11):e49632
references.pmid: 23226215
references.citation: PLoS Biol. 2009 Aug;7(8):e1000178
references.pmid: 19707271
references.citation: Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2009 Aug 4;106(31):12788-93
references.pmid: 19620720
references.citation: Oecologia. 2005 Jan;142(2):274-83
references.pmid: 15480805