Multiple stressors interact primarily through antagonism to drive changes in the coral microbiome.

ABSTRACT: Perturbations in natural systems generally are the combination of multiple interactions among individual stressors. However, methods to interpret the effects of interacting stressors remain challenging and are biased to identifying synergies which are prioritized in conservation. Therefore we conducted a multiple stressor experiment (no stress, single, double, triple) on the coral Pocillopora meandrina to evaluate how its microbiome changes compositionally with increasing levels of perturbation. We found that effects of nutrient enrichment, simulated predation, and increased temperature are antagonistic, rather than synergistic or additive, for a variety of microbial community diversity measures. Importantly, high temperature and scarring alone had the greatest effect on changing microbial

SUBMITTER: Maher RL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6497639 | biostudies-literature | 2019 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature