Short-term effects of CO₂-induced low pH exposure on target gene expression in Platynereis dumerilii

Objective: Increasing atmospheric CO₂ concentration are causing changes to the seawater carbonate chemistry, lowering the pH and we study potential impacts of these changes at the molecular level in a non-calcifying, marine polychaete species Platynereis dumerilii. Methods: we investigate the relati...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of Marine Biology & Oceanography
Main Authors: Rohr, Silvia, Wäge, Janine, Hardege, Jorg D, Rotchell, Jeanette M
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: OMICS International 2016
Subjects:
Ocean acidification
CO₂
Gene expression
Polychaeta
P. dumerilii
pH
Online Access:https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/file/440721/1/Article.pdf
https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/440721
https://doi.org/10.4172/2324-8661.1000155
Description
Summary:Objective: Increasing atmospheric CO₂ concentration are causing changes to the seawater carbonate chemistry, lowering the pH and we study potential impacts of these changes at the molecular level in a non-calcifying, marine polychaete species Platynereis dumerilii. Methods: we investigate the relative expression of carbonic anhydrase (CA), Na+/H+ exchangers (NHE), and calmodulin (CaM) genes from P. dumerilii under acidified seawater conditions (pH 7.8) induced by CO₂ using qPCR. Results: mRNA expression of CA in the CO₂-induced worms was significantly up-regulated at low pH conditions (pH 7.8, 1h), suggesting changes in acid-base balance. In contrast, the expression of NHE and CaM showed no significant change. In addition, we compare these results to a previous study using inorganic acid (HCl)-induced pH changes. Conclusions: results suggest that carbonate chemistry has an impact on gene expression that differs from pH-associated change. To our knowledge, this is the first study that compares low pH exposure experiments using HCl and CO₂ as the inducing agents.

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