The Reproductive Capacities of the Calanoid Copepods Parvocalanus crassirostis and Acartia pacifica under Different pH and Temperature Conditions

SIMPLE SUMMARY: Climate change has negatively affected marine organisms. This experimental study presents data from a multigenerational experiment on the egg production of two commonly occurring calanoid copepods, Parvocalanus crassirostis and Acartia pacifica, under different pH and temperature conditions. The results suggest that pH and temperature conditions influence the number of eggs produced by healthy copepod pairs. However, when the pH changes were gradually carried out over 14 generations, there was no significant difference in the egg production rate at ambient and lower pH. This suggests that copepod populations might be resilient to future ocean scenarios of lower pH and higher temperature. ABSTRACT: The increasing atmospheric CO(2) concentrations and warming of marine waters have encouraged experiments on multi-stressor interactions in marine organisms. We conducted a multigenerational experiment to assess reproductive capacities regarding egg production in calanoid copepods Parvocalanus crassirostis and Acartia pacifica under different pH and temperature conditions. The experimental set-up allowed assessing the tandem effect of warming and acidification on the number of eggs produced by healthy copepod pairs under two pH conditions of 8.20 and 7.50 (hard selection) as well as with a gradual reduction of 0.05 pH units at each generation (soft selection). The results are quite interesting, with very diverse performance across temperatures. The number of eggs produced under hard selection was higher at pH 8.20 compared to pH 7.50 for both species, with the maximum number of eggs produced at 24–28 °C, whereas under soft selection, there was no significant difference in the egg production rate at 24–28 °C across generations and there was an improvement in the number of eggs produced at 8–16 °C. The results provide evidence that in a future ocean scenario of lower pH and higher temperature, the two species, and possibly the copepod population at large, might not decrease. Copepod populations might be resilient, and the transcriptomic evidence of adaptation to increased temperature and lower pH is a ray of hope. We believe further studies are needed to provide more robust datasets to underpin the hypothesis of adaptation to climate change.