Parental experience may help coral offspring survive climate change

Adult corals were placed in closed chambers to measure physiology. Image courtesy of Hollie Putnam, HIMB.

A new study from scientists at the Hawaiʻi Institute of Marine Biology (HIMB) reveals that preconditioning adult corals to increased temperature and ocean acidification resulted in offspring that may be better able to handle those future environmental stressors. This rapid trans-generational acclimatization may be able to “buy time” for corals in the race against climate change.

Hollie Putnam, lead author of the Journal of Experimental Biology-featured study and HIMB assistant researcher; and Ruth Gates, co-author and HIMB senior researcher, exposed two groups of parental corals to either ambient ocean conditions or IPCC-predicted future ocean conditions—warmer and more acidic water. As expected, the harsher future conditions negatively affected the health of the parental coral—lowering photosynthesis and production to consumption ratios. Surprisingly, however, the offspring of parents who were exposed to future conditions appeared healthier when re-exposed to the harsher environment.

“By preconditioning the corals while the offspring are being brooded it may be possible to increase the offspring’s potential to perform under stressful environmental conditions,” said Putnam.

Read more about it on NSF’s Science 360 and the UH System News.