Experimental design in ocean acidification research: problems and solutions
Ocean acidification has been identified as a risk to marine ecosystems, and substantial scientific effort has been expended on investigating its effects, mostly in laboratory manipulation experiments. However, performing these manipulations correctly can be logistically difficult, and correctly desi...
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Academic Press Ltd Elsevier Science Ltd
2016
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Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsv118 http://ecite.utas.edu.au/104208 |
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ftunivtasecite:oai:ecite.utas.edu.au:104208 2023-05-15T17:49:29+02:00 Experimental design in ocean acidification research: problems and solutions Cornwall, CE Hurd, CL 2016 https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsv118 http://ecite.utas.edu.au/104208 en eng Academic Press Ltd Elsevier Science Ltd http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsv118 Cornwall, CE and Hurd, CL, Experimental design in ocean acidification research: problems and solutions, ICES Journal of Marine Science, 73, (3) pp. 572-581. ISSN 1054-3139 (2016) [Refereed Article] http://ecite.utas.edu.au/104208 Environmental Sciences Climate change impacts and adaptation Ecological impacts of climate change and ecological adaptation Refereed Article PeerReviewed 2016 ftunivtasecite https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsv118 2022-08-29T22:16:46Z Ocean acidification has been identified as a risk to marine ecosystems, and substantial scientific effort has been expended on investigating its effects, mostly in laboratory manipulation experiments. However, performing these manipulations correctly can be logistically difficult, and correctly designing experiments is complex, in part because of the rigorous requirements for manipulating and monitoring seawater carbonate chemistry. To assess the use of appropriate experimental design in ocean acidification research, 465 studies published between 1993 and 2014 were surveyed, focusing on the methods used to replicate experimental units. The proportion of studies that had interdependent or non-randomly interspersed treatment replicates, or did not report sufficient methodological details was 95%. Furthermore, 21% of studies did not provide any details of experimental design, 17% of studies otherwise segregated all the replicates for one treatment in one space, 15% of studies replicated CO 2 treatments in a way that made replicates more interdependent within treatments than between treatments, and 13% of studies did not report if replicates of all treatments were randomly interspersed. As a consequence, the number of experimental units used per treatment in studies was low (mean = 2.0). In a comparable analysis, there was a significant decrease in the number of published studies that employed inappropriate chemical methods of manipulating seawater (i.e. acidbase only additions) from 21 to 3%, following the release of the Guide to best practices for ocean acidification research and data reporting in 2010; however, no such increase in the use of appropriate replication and experimental design was observed after 2010. We provide guidelines on how to design ocean acidification laboratory experiments that incorporate the rigorous requirements for monitoring and measuring carbonate chemistry with a level of replication that increases the chances of accurate detection of biological responses to ocean acidification. Article in Journal/Newspaper Ocean acidification eCite UTAS (University of Tasmania) ICES Journal of Marine Science 73 3 572 581 |
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eCite UTAS (University of Tasmania) |
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ftunivtasecite |
language |
English |
topic |
Environmental Sciences Climate change impacts and adaptation Ecological impacts of climate change and ecological adaptation |
spellingShingle |
Environmental Sciences Climate change impacts and adaptation Ecological impacts of climate change and ecological adaptation Cornwall, CE Hurd, CL Experimental design in ocean acidification research: problems and solutions |
topic_facet |
Environmental Sciences Climate change impacts and adaptation Ecological impacts of climate change and ecological adaptation |
description |
Ocean acidification has been identified as a risk to marine ecosystems, and substantial scientific effort has been expended on investigating its effects, mostly in laboratory manipulation experiments. However, performing these manipulations correctly can be logistically difficult, and correctly designing experiments is complex, in part because of the rigorous requirements for manipulating and monitoring seawater carbonate chemistry. To assess the use of appropriate experimental design in ocean acidification research, 465 studies published between 1993 and 2014 were surveyed, focusing on the methods used to replicate experimental units. The proportion of studies that had interdependent or non-randomly interspersed treatment replicates, or did not report sufficient methodological details was 95%. Furthermore, 21% of studies did not provide any details of experimental design, 17% of studies otherwise segregated all the replicates for one treatment in one space, 15% of studies replicated CO 2 treatments in a way that made replicates more interdependent within treatments than between treatments, and 13% of studies did not report if replicates of all treatments were randomly interspersed. As a consequence, the number of experimental units used per treatment in studies was low (mean = 2.0). In a comparable analysis, there was a significant decrease in the number of published studies that employed inappropriate chemical methods of manipulating seawater (i.e. acidbase only additions) from 21 to 3%, following the release of the Guide to best practices for ocean acidification research and data reporting in 2010; however, no such increase in the use of appropriate replication and experimental design was observed after 2010. We provide guidelines on how to design ocean acidification laboratory experiments that incorporate the rigorous requirements for monitoring and measuring carbonate chemistry with a level of replication that increases the chances of accurate detection of biological responses to ocean acidification. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Cornwall, CE Hurd, CL |
author_facet |
Cornwall, CE Hurd, CL |
author_sort |
Cornwall, CE |
title |
Experimental design in ocean acidification research: problems and solutions |
title_short |
Experimental design in ocean acidification research: problems and solutions |
title_full |
Experimental design in ocean acidification research: problems and solutions |
title_fullStr |
Experimental design in ocean acidification research: problems and solutions |
title_full_unstemmed |
Experimental design in ocean acidification research: problems and solutions |
title_sort |
experimental design in ocean acidification research: problems and solutions |
publisher |
Academic Press Ltd Elsevier Science Ltd |
publishDate |
2016 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsv118 http://ecite.utas.edu.au/104208 |
genre |
Ocean acidification |
genre_facet |
Ocean acidification |
op_relation |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsv118 Cornwall, CE and Hurd, CL, Experimental design in ocean acidification research: problems and solutions, ICES Journal of Marine Science, 73, (3) pp. 572-581. ISSN 1054-3139 (2016) [Refereed Article] http://ecite.utas.edu.au/104208 |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsv118 |
container_title |
ICES Journal of Marine Science |
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73 |
container_issue |
3 |
container_start_page |
572 |
op_container_end_page |
581 |
_version_ |
1766155844088496128 |