Mediterranean versus Red sea corals facing climate change, a transcriptome analysis.
The anthropogenic increase in atmospheric CO2that drives global warming and ocean acidification raises serious concerns regarding the future of corals, the main carbonate biomineralizers. Here we used transcriptome analysis to study the effect of long-term gradual temperature increase (annual rate), combined with lowered pH values, on a sub-tropical Red Sea coral, Stylophora pistillata, and on a temperate Mediterranean symbiotic coral Balanophyllia europaea. The gene expression profiles revealed a strong effect of both temperature increase and pH decrease implying for synergism response. The temperate coral, exposed to a twice as high range of seasonal temperature fluctuations than the Red Sea species, faced stress more effectively. The compensatory strategy for coping apparently involves deviating cellular resources into a massive up-regulation of genes in general, and specifically of genes involved in the generation of metabolic energy. Our results imply that sub-lethal, prolonged exposure to stress can stimulate evolutionary increase in stress resilience.
The Mina and Everard Goodman Faculty of Life Sciences, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel.
Keren
K
Maor-Landaw
The Mina and Everard Goodman Faculty of Life Sciences, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel.
Hiba
H
Waldman Ben-Asher
The Mina and Everard Goodman Faculty of Life Sciences, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel.
Sarit
S
Karako-Lampert
Department of Molecular Biology, Ariel University, Ariel, Israel.
Mali
M
Salmon-Divon
Marine Science Group, Department of Biological, Geological and Environmental Sciences, Section of Biology, Alma Mater Studiorum-University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy.
Fiorella
F
Prada
Marine Science Group, Department of Biological, Geological and Environmental Sciences, Section of Biology, Alma Mater Studiorum-University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy.
Erik
E
Caroselli
Marine Science Group, Department of Biological, Geological and Environmental Sciences, Section of Biology, Alma Mater Studiorum-University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy.
Stefano
S
Goffredo
Dipartimento di Chimica 'G. Ciamician', Alma Mater Studiorum Università di Bologna, Bologna, Italy.
Giuseppe
G
Falini
The Mina and Everard Goodman Faculty of Life Sciences, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel.
Zvy
Z
Dubinsky
The Mina and Everard Goodman Faculty of Life Sciences, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel.
Oren
O
Levy
D022005:Adherens Junctions / Q000378:metabolism; D000818:Animals; D037421:Anthozoa / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism; D057231:Climate Change; D019295:Computational Biology / Q000379:methods; D020869:Gene Expression Profiling; D063990:Gene Ontology; D019156:Indian Ocean; D008522:Mediterranean Sea; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D015398:Signal Transduction; D059467:Transcriptome