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

PeerJ

article

Andrew G. Goode¹  David M. Fields¹  Stephen D. Archer¹  Joaquín Martínez Martínez¹ 

[1] Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences;School of Marine Sciences, University of Maine

关键词: Phytoplankton;    Emiliania huxleyi;    Carbon;    Virus;    Grazing;    Dinoflagellate;    Food web;    Zooplankton;    Growth;    Oxyrrhis marina;    Coccolithophore;   

DOI  :  10.7717/peerj.6722

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Inra

【 摘 要 】

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.

【 授权许可】

CC BY