Physiological responses of Oxyrrhis marina to a diet of virally infected Emiliania huxleyi.

Abstract:

:The coccolithophore Emiliania huxleyi forms some of the largest phytoplankton blooms in the ocean. The rapid demise of these blooms has been linked to viral infections. E. huxleyi abundance, distribution, and nutritional status make them an important food source for the heterotrophic protists which are classified as microzooplankton in marine food webs. In this study we investigated the fate of E. huxleyi (CCMP 374) infected with virus strain EhV-86 in a simple predator-prey interaction. The ingestion rates of Oxyrrhis marina were significantly lower (between 26.9 and 50.4%) when fed virus-infected E. huxleyi cells compared to non-infected cells. Despite the lower ingestion rates, O. marina showed significantly higher growth rates (between 30 and 91.3%) when fed infected E. huxleyi cells, suggesting higher nutritional value and/or greater assimilation of infected E. huxleyi cells. No significant differences were found in O. marina cell volumes or fatty acids profiles. These results show that virally infected E. huxleyi support higher growth rates of single celled heterotrophs and in addition to the "viral shunt" hypothesis, viral infections may also divert more carbon to mesozooplankton grazers.

journal_name

PeerJ

journal_title

PeerJ

authors

Goode AG,Fields DM,Archer SD,Martínez Martínez J

doi

10.7717/peerj.6722

subject

Has Abstract

pub_date

2019-04-19 00:00:00

pages

e6722

issn

2167-8359

pii

6722

journal_volume

7

pub_type

杂志文章

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