Sounds as taxonomic indicators in Holocentrid fishes.

The species-specific character of sounds in the animal kingdom has been extensively documented, yet research on fishes has predominantly focused on a limited number of species, overlooking the potential of acoustic signals to reflect broader taxonomic ranks. In this study, we analyzed acoustic data of hand-held sounds from 388 specimens spanning 5 genera and 33 species within the family Holocentridae, with the objective of evaluating the use of sound characteristics for taxonomic discrimination across various levels (subfamily, genus, species). Sounds could be indicative of grouping.

Genomic data reveals habitat partitioning in massive Porites on Guam, Micronesia.

Corals in marginal reef habitats generally exhibit less bleaching and associated mortality compared to nearby corals in more pristine reef environments. It is unclear, however, if these differences are due to environmental differences, including turbidity, or genomic differences between the coral hosts in these different environments. One particularly interesting case is in the coral genus Porites, which contains numerous morphologically similar massive Porites species inhabiting a wide range of reef habitats, from turbid river deltas and stagnant back reefs to high-energy fore reefs.

Production of sounds by squirrelfish during symbiotic relationships with cleaner wrasses.

Examples of symbiotic relationships often include cleaning mutualisms, typically involving interactions between cleaner fish and other fish, called the clients. While these cleaners can cooperate by removing ectoparasites from their clients, they can also deceive by feeding on client mucus, a behavior usually referred to as "cheating behavior" that often leads to a discernible jolt from the client fish. Despite extensive studies of these interactions, most research has focused on the visual aspects of the communication.

Multi-Factor Coral Disease Risk: A new product for early warning and management.

Ecological forecasts are becoming increasingly valuable tools for conservation and management. However, there are few examples of near-real-time forecasting systems that account for the wide range of ecological complexities. We developed a new coral disease ecological forecasting system that explores a suite of ecological relationships and their uncertainty and investigates how forecast skill changes with shorter lead times.

Giants among Cnidaria: Large Nuclear Genomes and Rearranged Mitochondrial Genomes in Siphonophores.

Siphonophores (Cnidaria: Hydrozoa) are abundant predators found throughout the ocean and are important constituents of the global zooplankton community. They range in length from a few centimeters to tens of meters. They are gelatinous, fragile, and difficult to collect, so many aspects of the biology of these roughly 200 species remain poorly understood.

Induction of larval settlement in crown-of-thorns starfish is not mediated by conspecific cues.

Population irruptions of crown-of-thorns starfish (COTS; Acanthaster spp.) remain a major cause of coral reef degradation throughout the Pacific and Indian Oceans and are inherently modulated by larval settlement and recruitment success. Gregarious larval settlement, as exhibited by many other ecologically important marine invertebrates, can catalyse population growth and replenishment.

Spatial extent of dysbiosis in the branching coral Pocillopora damicornis during an acute disease outbreak.

Globally, coral reefs face increasing disease prevalence and large-scale outbreak events. These outbreaks offer insights into microbial and functional patterns of coral disease, including early indicators of disease that may be present in visually-healthy tissues. Outbreak events also allow investigation of how reef-building corals, typically colonial organisms, respond to disease.

Impacts of ocean warming on echinoderms: A meta-analysis.

Rising ocean temperatures are threatening marine species and populations worldwide, and ectothermic taxa are particularly vulnerable. Echinoderms are an ecologically important phylum of marine ectotherms and shifts in their population dynamics can have profound impacts on the marine environment. The effects of warming on echinoderms are highly variable across controlled laboratory-based studies.

Exceptional population genomic homogeneity in the black brittle star Ophiocomina nigra (Ophiuroidea, Echinodermata) along the Atlantic-Mediterranean coast.

The Atlantic-Mediterranean marine transition is characterised by strong oceanographic barriers and steep environmental gradients that generally result in connectivity breaks between populations from both basins and may lead to local adaptation. Here, we performed a population genomic study of the black brittle star, Ophiocomina nigra, covering most of its distribution range along the Atlantic-Mediterranean region. Interestingly, O.

Genomic signatures suggesting adaptation to ocean acidification in a coral holobiont from volcanic CO seeps.

Ocean acidification, caused by anthropogenic CO emissions, is predicted to have major consequences for reef-building corals, jeopardizing the scaffolding of the most biodiverse marine habitats. However, whether corals can adapt to ocean acidification and how remains unclear. We addressed these questions by re-examining transcriptome and genome data of Acropora millepora coral holobionts from volcanic CO seeps with end-of-century pH levels.

Ageing of juvenile coral grouper () reveals year-round spawning and recruitment: implications for seasonal closures.

Temporal patterns in spawning and juvenile recruitment can have major effects on population size and the demographic structure of coral reef fishes. For harvested species, these patterns are crucial in determining stock size and optimizing management strategies such as seasonal closures. For the commercially important coral grouper ( spp.

Moderate chlorophyll-a environments reduce coral bleaching during thermal stress in Yap, Micronesia.

Thermal-stress events on coral reefs lead to coral bleaching, mortality, and changes in species composition. The coral reefs of Yap, in the Federated States of Micronesia, however, remained largely unaffected by major thermal-stress events until 2020, when temperatures were elevated for three months. Twenty-nine study sites were examined around Yap to determine geographical and taxonomic patterns of coral abundance, bleaching susceptibility, and environmental predictors of bleaching susceptibility.

Macroalgae exhibit diverse responses to human disturbances on coral reefs.

Scientists and managers rely on indicator taxa such as coral and macroalgal cover to evaluate the effects of human disturbance on coral reefs, often assuming a universally positive relationship between local human disturbance and macroalgae. Despite evidence that macroalgae respond to local stressors in diverse ways, there have been few efforts to evaluate relationships between specific macroalgae taxa and local human-driven disturbance. Using genus-level monitoring data from 1205 sites in the Indian and Pacific Oceans, we assess whether macroalgae percent cover correlates with local human disturbance while accounting for factors that could obscure or confound relationships.

Using size-weight relationships to estimate biomass of heavily targeted aquarium corals by Australia's coral harvest fisheries.

Coral reefs are highly threatened environs subject to ongoing unprecedented degradation as a result of anthropogenic activities. Given the existential threat to coral reef ecosystems, extractive industries that make use of coral reef resources, are facing significant public and political pressure to quantify and justify their environmental impact. In Australia, hundreds of thousands of live scleractinian (hard) corals are harvested annually directly from the wild to supply the growing international marine aquarium trade.

Settlement cue selectivity by larvae of the destructive crown-of-thorns starfish.

Population irruptions of crown-of-thorns starfish (COTS) cause extensive degradation of coral reefs, threatening the structure and function of these important ecosystems. For population irruptions to initiate and spread, large numbers of planktonic larvae have to successfully transition into their benthic life-history stage (i.e.

Nutrient thresholds to protect water quality, coral reefs, and nearshore fisheries.

A ridge-to-reef framework was developed for 26 watersheds around Guam. Dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) data were collected for one year at the base of streams while coral and fish surveys were conducted on adjacent reefs. Two independent analyses revealed a similar 0.

Changes in coral reef community structure along a sediment gradient in Fouha Bay, Guam.

High sedimentation rates have well-documented, deleterious impacts on coral reefs. However, few previous studies have attempted to quantitatively describe a coral reef community across a large continuous sediment gradient. In this study distinct benthic assemblages in Fouha Bay, Guam, were identified using a Moving Window Analysis conducted along a two-order of magnitude sediment gradient, with transition boundaries that were generally consistent with sediment thresholds identified in the literature.

Maximization of fitness by phenological and phenotypic plasticity in range expanding rabbitfishes (Siganidae).

Global warming is modifying the phenology, life-history traits and biogeography of species around the world. Evidence of these effects have increased over recent decades; however, we still have a poor understanding of the possible outcomes of their interplay across global climatic gradients, hindering our ability to accurately predict the consequences of climate change in populations and ecosystems. We examined the effect that changes in biogeography can have on the life-history traits of two of the most successful range-extending fish species in the world: the tropical rabbitfishes Siganus fuscescens and Siganus rivulatus.

Effects of elevated temperature on reproduction and larval settlement in .

Unlabelled: As global ocean temperatures continue to rise, severe declines in coral reef health and diversity are reported on a global scale. Recovery of coral reefs relies on reproduction and increased rates of successful recruitment, which can vary tremendously across coral species. We investigated the effects of increased temperatures in the environment of parental colonies on larval production, size, settlement and survival, in the heat-resistant coral in Guam Thanks to two tank experiments (eleven and four weeks, respectively) conducted over two consecutive years we found that larvae released by heat-treated parents (30 °C) were significantly smaller in size but greater in number, had normal settlement behavior and increased post-settlement survival rates compared to those released by control parent colonies (28 °C).

Stereochemical Assignment and Absolute Abundance of Nonproteinogenic Amino Acid Homoarginine in Marine Sponges.

Together with arginine, the nonproteinogenic amino acid homoarginine is a substrate for the production of vasodilator nitric oxide in the human body. In marine sponges, homoarginine has been postulated to serve as a precursor for the biosynthesis of pyrrole-imidazole alkaloid and bromotyrosine alkaloid classes of natural products. The absolute abundance of homoarginine, its abundance relative to arginine, and its stereochemical assignment in marine sponges are not known.

Diversity and toxicity of Pacific strains of the benthic dinoflagellate Coolia (Dinophyceae), with a look at the Coolia canariensis species complex.

Coolia Meunier 1919 from benthic assemblages of Hawai'i and Guam were isolated and clonal cultures were established from single cells. Cultures were identified to species-level based on 28S rRNA and ITS-5.8S rRNA genes and tested for toxicity.

Evolutionary management of coral-reef fisheries using phylogenies to predict density dependence.

Harvesting models are based upon the ideology that removing large, old individuals provides space for young, fast-growing counterparts that can maximize (fisheries) yields while maintaining population stability and ecosystem function. Yet, this compensatory density dependent response has rarely been examined in multispecies systems. We combined extensive data sets from coral-reef fisheries across a suite of Pacific islands and provided unique context to the universal assumptions of compensatory density dependence.

Enzymatic Synthesis Assisted Discovery of Proline-Rich Macrocyclic Peptides in Marine Sponges.

Proline-rich macrocyclic peptides (PRMPs) are natural products present in geographically and phylogenetically dispersed marine sponges. The large diversity and low abundance of PRMPs in sponge metabolomes precludes isolation and structure elucidation of each individual PRMP congener. Here, using standards developed via biomimetic enzymatic synthesis of PRMPs, a mass spectrometry-based workflow to sequence PRMPs was developed and validated to reveal that the diversity of PRMPs in marine sponges is much greater than that has been realized by natural product isolation-based strategies.