Mate choice in a keystone invertebrate (copepod <em>Acartia tonsa</em>) under different climate scenarios — ASN Events

Mate choice in a keystone invertebrate (copepod Acartia tonsa) under different climate scenarios (#697)

Ana Lopes 1 , Miguel Baptista 1 , José Paula 1 , Tiago Repolho 1 , Rui Rosa 1
  1. MARE - Marine and Environmental Sciences Centre, Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade de Lisboa, Cascais, Portugal

For many marine species the primal act of mating is not random. In fact, most organisms require information to make decisions about potential mates. This information can be acquired using “personal information”, by observing specific physical characteristics of mates, or by “public information”, by perceiving their mating performance. In this study we aimed to know, for the first time, if mate-choice (public vs personal information) in the calanoid copepod Acartia tonsa is changed under different climate scenarios, namely present-day conditions (18ᵒC, pH 8.0 and 5 mg L-1 O2), future ocean warming (+3ᵒC), acidification (∆pH 0.4) and rising hypoxia (<2 mg O2 L-1). More specifically, females from the control treatment (under present-day conditions) were allowed to (i) choose between one male from the same condition and one male acclimated to future ocean predictions, and (ii) observe two other females choosing their mate in the same conditions described in (i). With these present findings we show how the conditions of the ocean of tomorrow affect mate choice copying in this keystone estuarine invertebrate.