Multiple resiliency metrics reveal complementary drivers of ecosystem persistence: An application to kelp forest systems.

Human-caused global change produces biotic and abiotic conditions that increase the uncertainty and risk of failure of restoration efforts. A focus of managing for resiliency, that is, the ability of the system to respond to disturbance, has the potential to reduce this uncertainty and risk. However, identifying what drives resiliency might depend on how one measures it.

Resistance of rocky intertidal communities to oceanic climate fluctuations.

A powerful way to predict how ecological communities will respond to future climate change is to test how they have responded to the climate of the past. We used climate oscillations including the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), North Pacific Gyre Oscillation, and El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and variation in upwelling, air temperature, and sea temperatures to test the sensitivity of nearshore rocky intertidal communities to climate variability. Prior research shows that multiple ecological processes of key taxa (growth, recruitment, and physiology) were sensitive to environmental variation during this time frame.

Sunflower sea star predation on urchins can facilitate kelp forest recovery.

The recent collapse of predatory sunflower sea stars () owing to sea star wasting disease (SSWD) is hypothesized to have contributed to proliferation of sea urchin barrens and losses of kelp forests on the North American west coast. We used experiments and a model to test whether restored populations may help recover kelp forests through their consumption of nutritionally poor purple sea urchins () typical of barrens. consumed 0.

Strategies for managing marine disease.

The incidence of emerging infectious diseases (EIDs) has increased in wildlife populations in recent years and is expected to continue to increase with global environmental change. Marine diseases are relatively understudied compared with terrestrial diseases but warrant parallel attention as they can disrupt ecosystems, cause economic loss, and threaten human livelihoods. Although there are many existing tools to combat the direct and indirect consequences of EIDs, these management strategies are often insufficient or ineffective in marine habitats compared with their terrestrial counterparts, often due to fundamental differences between marine and terrestrial systems.

Increasing instability of a rocky intertidal meta-ecosystem.

Climate change threatens to destabilize ecological communities, potentially moving them from persistently occupied "basins of attraction" to different states. Increasing variation in key ecological processes can signal impending state shifts in ecosystems. In a rocky intertidal meta-ecosystem consisting of three distinct regions spread across 260 km of the Oregon coast, we show that annually cleared sites are characterized by communities that exhibit signs of increasing destabilization (loss of resilience) over the past decade despite persistent community states.

Little evidence for genetic variation associated with susceptibility to sea star wasting syndrome in the keystone species Pisaster ochraceus.

The keystone species Pisaster ochraceus suffered mass mortalities along the northeast Pacific Ocean from Sea Star Wasting Syndrome (SSWS) outbreaks in 2013-2016. SSWS causation remains of debate, leading to concerns as to whether outbreaks will continue to impact this species. Considering the apparent link between ocean temperature and SSWS, the future of this species and intertidal communities remains uncertain.

Disease-driven mass mortality event leads to widespread extirpation and variable recovery potential of a marine predator across the eastern Pacific.

The prevalence of disease-driven mass mortality events is increasing, but our understanding of spatial variation in their magnitude, timing and triggers are often poorly resolved. Here, we use a novel range-wide dataset comprised 48 810 surveys to quantify how sea star wasting disease affected , the sunflower sea star, across its range from Baja California, Mexico to the Aleutian Islands, USA. We found that the outbreak occurred more rapidly, killed a greater percentage of the population and left fewer survivors in the southern half of the species's range.

Transformative Research Is Not Easily Predicted.

Transformative research (TR) statements in scientific grant proposals have become mainstream. However, TR is defined as radically changing our understanding of a concept, causing a paradigm shift, or opening new frontiers. We argue that it is rarely possible to predict the transformative nature of research.

Shifts in intertidal zonation and refuge use by prey after mass mortalities of two predators.

Recent mass mortalities of two predatory sea star species provided an unprecedented opportunity to test the effect of predators on rocky intertidal prey. Mass mortalities provide insight that manipulative experiments cannot because they alter ecosystems on a larger scale, for longer time periods, and remove both organisms and their cues from the environment. We examined shifts in population size structure, vertical zonation, and use of emersed refuge habitats outside tidepools by the abundant herbivorous black turban snail Tegula funebralis, both before and after the successive mortalities of two predatory sea stars.

Correction: Sea Star Wasting Disease in the Keystone Predator Pisaster ochraceus in Oregon: Insights into Differential Population Impacts, Recovery, Predation Rate, and Temperature Effects from Long-Term Research.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.

Sea Star Wasting Disease in the Keystone Predator Pisaster ochraceus in Oregon: Insights into Differential Population Impacts, Recovery, Predation Rate, and Temperature Effects from Long-Term Research.

Sea star wasting disease (SSWD) first appeared in Oregon in April 2014, and by June had spread to most of the coast. Although delayed compared to areas to the north and south, SSWD was initially most intense in north and central Oregon and spread southward. Up to 90% of individuals showed signs of disease from June-August 2014.