About This Project

We hypothesize that wild marine animals prefer temperatures that are colder than their physiological optima. Further, we hypothesize that under a more variable environments such as marine heat waves or El Niño, wild animals adjust their preference to even colder temperatures to reduce the risk of being exposed to lethal hot conditions. If these animals are choosing colder temperatures they increase their chances of survival at the expense of energetic performance.

Ask the Scientists

What is the context of this research?

Evolutionary theory and observations in lizards, fishes, and some invertebrates suggest that (at least) some organisms prefer temperatures that are colder than the physiological optimum to reduce the risk of getting exposed to their high temperature limit. We propose that the level of precaution depends on the environmental variability perceived by the organism, even when it means scarifying performance. Climate change is affecting marine ecosystems. We are witnessing increments in both the average temperature and the variability levels. If our hypothesis is supported, climate change may result in organisms moving in search for colder conditions, potentially affecting their growth rates, reproduction, and resistance to illness.

What is the significance of this project?

This simple experiment would subtantially increase our understanding about the adaptation capacity of benthic marine animals, and will propel larger-scale projects. It is important and urgent to understand these issues, facing a rapidly changing coastal environments and the potentially dramatic consequences for marine ecosystems. This is a key information piece currently neglected in most ecological models projecting the impacts of climate change in the ocean.

What are the goals of the project?

We want to test if marine invertebrates adjust their temperature preferences as a function of environmental varability. We will expose one group of abalones to relatively stable conditions and another to a highly variable temperatures regime. Then each group would be divided into two subgroups, one used to evaluate physiological performance at different temperatures, and the other will be submitted to a thermal gradient where they would be free to move, to register their thermal preference. In the end, we will be able to compare the optimum and preferred temperature for organisms coming from stable and from variable conditions. Our hypothesis will be supported if the abalone in high variability conditions travel greater distances than the control.