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Search for mesophotic octocorals (Cnidaria, Anthozoa) and their phylogeny. II. A new zooxanthellate species from Eilat, northern Red Sea.

ABSTRACT: An octocoral survey conducted in the mesophotic coral ecosystem (MCE) of Eilat (Gulf of Aqaba, northern Red Sea) yielded a new species of the speciose reef-dwelling genus Sinularia. It features encrusting colony morphology with a thin, funnel-shaped polypary. Sinularia mesophoticasp. n. (family Alcyoniidae) is described and compared to the other congeners with similar morphology. Both the morphological and molecular examination justified the establishment of the new species, also assigning it to a new genetic clade within Sinularia. The results highlight its unique phylogenetic position within the genus, and this is the first described species of a mesophotic zooxanthellate octocoral.

SUBMITTER: Benayahu Y

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5523203 | biostudies-literature | 2017

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Search for mesophotic octocorals (Cnidaria, Anthozoa) and their phylogeny. II. A new zooxanthellate species from Eilat, northern Red Sea.

Benayahu Yehuda Y McFadden Catherine S CS Shoham Erez E van Ofwegen Leen P LP

ZooKeys 20170523 676

An octocoral survey conducted in the mesophotic coral ecosystem (MCE) of Eilat (Gulf of Aqaba, northern Red Sea) yielded a new species of the speciose reef-dwelling genus Sinularia. It features encrusting colony morphology with a thin, funnel-shaped polypary. Sinularia mesophoticasp. n. (family Alcyoniidae) is described and compared to the other congeners with similar morphology. Both the morphological and molecular examination justified the establishment of the new species, ...[more]

PMID: 28769683

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Project description:Increases in Sea Surface Temperatures (SSTs) as a result of global warming have caused reef-building scleractinian corals to bleach worldwide, a result of the loss of obligate endosymbiotic zooxanthellae. Since the 1980's, bleaching severity and frequency has increased, in some cases causing mass mortality of corals. Earlier experiments have demonstrated that zooxanthellae in scleractinian corals from three families from the Great Barrier Reef, Australia (Faviidae, Poritidae, and Acroporidae) are more sensitive to heat stress than their hosts, exhibiting differential symptoms of programmed cell death - apoptosis and necrosis. Most zooxanthellar phylotypes are dying during expulsion upon release from the host. The host corals appear to be adapted or exapted to the heat increases. We attempt to determine whether this adaptation/exaptation occurs in octocorals by examining the heat-sensitivities of zooxanthellae and their host octocoral alcyonacean soft corals - Sarcophyton ehrenbergi (Alcyoniidae), Sinularia lochmodes (Alcyoniidae), and Xenia elongata (Xeniidae), species from two different families. The soft coral holobionts were subjected to experimental seawater temperatures of 28, 30, 32, 34, and 36°C for 48 hrs. Host and zooxanthellar cells were examined for viability, apoptosis, and necrosis (in hospite and expelled) using transmission electron microscopy (TEM), fluorescent microscopy (FM), and flow cytometry (FC). As experimental temperatures increased, zooxanthellae generally exhibited apoptotic and necrotic symptoms at lower temperatures than host cells and were expelled. Responses varied species-specifically. Soft coral hosts were adapted/exapted to higher seawater temperatures than their zooxanthellae. As with the scleractinians, the zooxanthellae appear to be the limiting factor for survival of the holobiont in the groups tested, in this region. These limits have now been shown to operate in six species within five families and two orders of the Cnidaria in the western Pacific. We hypothesize that this relationship may have taxonomic implications for other obligate zooxanthellate cnidarians subject to bleaching.

Dataset Information

Search for mesophotic octocorals (Cnidaria, Anthozoa) and their phylogeny. II. A new zooxanthellate species from Eilat, northern Red Sea.

Publications

Search for mesophotic octocorals (Cnidaria, Anthozoa) and their phylogeny. II. A new zooxanthellate species from Eilat, northern Red Sea.

Similar Datasets

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