Effects of elevated pCO2 on the early development of the commercially important gastropod, Ezo abalone Haliotis discus hannai

Abstract

We used an up-to-date, a high accuracy CO2 manipulation system to investigate the sensitivity of organisms to CO2 acidification, rearing marine calcifiers under elevated CO2 in running water. We evaluated the effects of elevated partial pressures of carbon dioxide (pCO2) in seawater on larvae of the commercially important marine gastropod Ezo abalone Haliotis discus hannai. In larval Ezo abalone, no effect of exposure to <1100 μatm pCO2 seawater was observed in fertilization, malformation, or mortality rates until 15 h after fertilization. However, compared to control larvae in seawater (450 or 500 μatm pCO2), the fertilization rate and the hatching rate (15 h after fertilization) decreased with increased pCO2 exposure (1650 and 2150 μatm pCO2) and the malformation rate increased significantly, with the larval shell length being smaller 75 h after hatching. These results suggest that ocean acidification will potentially impact the marine population of Ezo abalone as a human food source in the future.