Climate adaptive loci revealed by seascape genomics correlate with phenotypic variation in heat tolerance of the coral Acropora millepora.

One of the main challenges in coral reef conservation and restoration is the identification of coral populations resilient under global warming. Seascape genomics is a powerful tool to uncover genetic markers potentially involved in heat tolerance among large populations without prior information on phenotypes. Here, we aimed to provide first insights on the role of candidate heat associated loci identified using seascape genomics in driving the phenotypic response of Acropora millepora from New Caledonia to thermal stress.

Thermal tolerance traits of individual corals are widely distributed across the Great Barrier Reef.

Adaptation of reef-building corals to global warming depends upon standing heritable variation in tolerance traits upon which selection can act. Yet limited knowledge exists on heat-tolerance variation among conspecific individuals separated by metres to hundreds of kilometres. Here, we performed standardized acute heat-stress assays to quantify the thermal tolerance traits of 709 colonies of from 13 reefs spanning 1060 km (9.