We study the microenvironmental ecology of microbial communities & symbiosis. We explore corals, seagrass, macroalgae, biofilms & microbes. We work across disciplines to develop and apply microscale analysis tools.
Michael Kühl https://t.co/1qPNWHLjow
Microenvironmental Ecology and Symbiosis
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To uncover the relationship between movement and oxygen uptake, the team had to devise a brand-new way of seeing what was going on, using high-speed footage capture and a long distance microscope.
Chemistry World
www.linkedin.com/posts/michae...
Microenvironmental Ecology and Symbiosis
But the benefit doesn’t last. As temperatures rise further, these flows begin recirculating oxygen poor water near the coral surface, while coral oxygen demand keeps increasing.
Under moderate warming, corals initially cope as their cilia starts to beat faster, essentially creating stronger swirls and temporarily improving oxygen transport.
This mechanism is particularly important at night when both the coral and symbiotic algae consume oxygen.
Coral reefs are increasingly threaten by marine heatwaves, but what pushes corals past their breaking point?
New in @ScienceAdvances @science.org: we found that corals can lose the microscopic system that helps move oxygen around their tissues during heat stress 🪸
doi.org/10.1126/scia...
Ciliary flows buffer coral O2 supply under heat stress until a tipping point, above which hypoxia and tissue failure are induced.
doi.org
Our findings reveal a hidden tipping point in coral survival: corals may begin to suffocate internally before or alongside bleaching.
These process occur in a water layer <1mm tick, easy to miss in conventional measurements but potentially critical for understanding coral health.
