Temperature patterns and mechanisms influencing coral bleaching during the 2016 El Niño

McClanahan, T.R. and Darling, E.S. and Maina, J.M. and Muthiga, N.A. and ’agata, S.D. and Jupiter, S.D. and Arthur, R. and Wilson, S.K. and Mangubhai, S. and Nand, Y. and Ussi, A.M. and Humphries, A.T. and Patankar, V.J. and Guillaume, M.M.M. and Keith, S.A. and Shedrawi, G. and Julius, P. and Grimsditch, G. and Ndagala, J. and Leblond, J. (2019) Temperature patterns and mechanisms influencing coral bleaching during the 2016 El Niño. Nature Climate Change, 9 (11). pp. 845-851. ISSN 1758-678X

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Abstract

Under extreme heat stress, corals expel their symbiotic algae and colour (that is, ‘bleaching’), which often leads to widespread mortality. Predicting the large-scale environmental conditions that reinforce or mitigate coral bleaching remains unresolved and limits strategic conservation actions. Here we assessed coral bleaching at 226 sites and 26 environmental variables that represent different mechanisms of stress responses from East Africa to Fiji through a coordinated effort to evaluate the coral response to the 2014–2016 El Niño/Southern Oscillation thermal anomaly. We applied common time-series methods to study the temporal patterning of acute thermal stress and evaluated the effectiveness of conventional and new sea surface temperature metrics and mechanisms in predicting bleaching severity. The best models indicated the importance of peak hot temperatures, the duration of cool temperatures and temperature bimodality, which explained ~50% of the variance, compared to the common degree-heating week temperature index that explained only 9%. Our findings suggest that the threshold concept as a mechanism to explain bleaching alone was not as powerful as the multidimensional interactions of stresses, which include the duration and temporal patterning of hot and cold temperature extremes relative to average local conditions.

Item Type:
Journal Article
Journal or Publication Title:
Nature Climate Change
Uncontrolled Keywords:
/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/3300/3301
Subjects:
?? ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE (MISCELLANEOUS)SOCIAL SCIENCES (MISCELLANEOUS) ??
ID Code:
138953
Deposited By:
Deposited On:
14 Nov 2019 11:30
Refereed?:
Yes
Published?:
Published
Last Modified:
19 Sep 2023 02:19