Seawater carbonate chemistry and changes in coral reef community structure in response to year‑long incubations under contrasting pCO2 regimes ...

• Main Authors: Edmunds, Peter J, Doo, Steve S, Carpenter, Robert C
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: PANGAEA 2023
• Subjects: Animalia; Benthic animals; Benthos; Calcification/Dissolution; Cnidaria; Coast and continental shelf; Community composition and diversity; Containers and aquaria 20-1000 L or < 1 m**2; Entire community; Laboratory experiment; Lithophyllum kotschyanum; Macroalgae; massive Porites; Montipora sp.; Plantae; Pocillopora verrucosa; Porites rus; Porolithon onkodes; Rhodophyta; Rocky-shore community; Single species; South Pacific; Tropical; Type of study; Identification; Treatment partial pressure of carbon dioxide; Number; Year of sampling; Month; Species; Area; Group; Dry mass; Temperature, water; Partial pressure of carbon dioxide water at sea surface temperature wet air; Alkalinity, total; pH; Salinity; Carbonate system computation flag; Carbon dioxide; Fugacity of carbon dioxide water at sea surface temperature wet air; Bicarbonate ion; Carbonate ion; Carbon, inorganic, dissolved; Aragonite saturation state; Calcite saturation state; Experiment; Potentiometric titration; Potentiometric; Calculated using seacarb after Nisumaa et al. 2010; Ocean acidification
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.1594/pangaea.959725; https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.959725

Coral reefs are threatened by ocean acidification (OA), which depresses net calcification of corals, calcified algae, and coral reef communities. These effects have been quantified for many organisms, but most experiments last weeks-to-months, and do not test for effects on community structure. Here, the effects of OA on back reef communities from Mo'orea, French Polynesia (17.492 S, 149.826 W), were tested from 12 November 2015 to 16 November 2016 in outdoor flumes maintained at mean pCO2 levels of 364 µatm, 564 µatm, 761 µatm, and 1067 µatm. The communities consisted of four corals and two calcified algae, with change in mass (Gnet, a combination of gross accretion and dissolution) and percent cover recorded monthly. For massive Porites and Montipora spp., Gnet differed among treatments, and at 1067 µatm (relative to ambient) was reduced and still positive; for Porolithon onkodes, all of which died, Gnet was negative at high pCO2, revealing dissolution (sample sizes were too small for analysis of Gnet for ... : In order to allow full comparability with other ocean acidification data sets, the R package seacarb (Gattuso et al, 2022) was used to compute a complete and consistent set of carbonate system variables, as described by Nisumaa et al. (2010). In this dataset the original values were archived in addition with the recalculated parameters (see related PI). The date of carbonate chemistry calculation by seacarb is 2023-06-08. ...