%0 Journal Article
%T Reviewing the Effects of Ocean Acidification on Sexual Reproduction and Early Life History Stages of Reef-Building Corals
%A Rebecca Albright
%J Journal of Marine Biology
%D 2011
%I Hindawi Publishing Corporation
%R 10.1155/2011/473615
%X Ocean acidification (OA) is a relatively young yet rapidly developing scientific field. Assessing the potential response(s) of marine organisms to projected near-future OA scenarios has been at the forefront of scientific research, with a focus on ecosystems (e.g., coral reefs) and processes (e.g., calcification) that are deemed particularly vulnerable. Recently, a heightened emphasis has been placed on evaluating early life history stages as these stages are generally perceived to be more sensitive to environmental change. The number of acidification-related studies focused on early life stages has risen dramatically over the last several years. While early life history stages of corals have been understudied compared to other marine invertebrate taxa (e.g., echinoderms, mollusks), numerous studies exist to contribute to our status of knowledge regarding the potential impacts of OA on coral recruitment dynamics. To synthesize this information, the present paper reviews the primary literature on the effects of acidification on sexual reproduction and early stages of corals, incorporating lessons learned from more thoroughly studied taxa to both assess our current understanding of the potential impacts of OA on coral recruitment and to inform and guide future research in this area. 1. Introduction Coral reefs harbor one of the most diverse ecosystems on the planet in terms of species complexity [1] and are sources of vast economic wealth through a variety of ecosystem goods and services [2]. Despite the profound ecological and economic importance of these valuable marine ecosystems, global degradation of coral reefs has resulted in unprecedented loss over the past several decades [3¨C8]. Given the current trends in reef degradation, it is critical to understand processes that may allow these valuable marine ecosystems to persist. The recovery and persistence of a population, and of a species, requires that levels of recruitment keep pace with the loss of adult individuals [9, 10]. Successful coral recruitment, that is, the introduction and inclusion of a new individual to a population, is generally determined by three sequential life history stages: (1) larval availability (including gamete production and successful fertilization), (2) settlement ecology (related to larval and substrate condition), and (3) postsettlement ecology (growth and survival of the newly settled individual) [11]. Larval settlement and subsequent survival (recruitment) are processes that can control marine population dynamics [12, 13]. Environmental factors that disrupt these
%U http://www.hindawi.com/journals/jmb/2011/473615/