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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Mar. Sci.
Sec. Global Change and the Future Ocean
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fmars.2024.1464511
This article is part of the Research Topic Impacts of Climate Change on Seaweeds View all 4 articles

Ocean warming enhances the competitive advantage of Ulva prolifera over a golden tide alga, Sargassum horneri under eutrophication

Provisionally accepted
Hailong Wu Hailong Wu 1*Jiankai Zhang Jiankai Zhang 1He Li He Li 1Sufang Li Sufang Li 1Chen Pan Chen Pan 1Lefei Yi Lefei Yi 1Juntian Xu Juntian Xu 1Peimin He Peimin He 2
  • 1 Jiangsu Ocean Universiity, Lianyungang, China
  • 2 Shanghai Ocean University, Shanghai, Shanghai Municipality, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Recent years have seen the Ulva green tide and Sargassum golden tide become commonplace in the coastal waters of China. However, little is known on how the combination of ocean warming and eutrophication would affect the interaction of green and golden tides. In this study, we cultured the green tide alga Ulva prolifera and the golden tide alga Sargassum horneri under different temperatures (5, 10, 15, 20, 25, and 30 °C) and two nutrient concentrations (Low nutrient, LN: 5 μM-nitrate and 0.5 μM-phosphate; High nutrient, HN: 500 μM-N and 50 μM-P) in both monoculture and coculture systems to investigate the physiological responses and their competitive relationships. In monocultures, the growth of U. prolifera and S. horneri, along with pigment concentrations and photosynthesis, increased with rising temperature, reaching a plateau at 15 -25 ℃. However, when the temperature increased to 30 ℃, the growth of U. prolifera and S. horneri decreased abruptly, with S. horneri even suffering death.In coculture, the growth of both U. prolifera and S. horneri was inhibited compared to the monoculture, with the greatest decline observed in S. horneri at 25 ℃ under two nutrient conditions. Our results show that U. prolifera would outcompete S. horneri under high temperature in coculture, suggesting that ocean warming would enhance the competitive advantage of green tide over golden tide under eutrophication in the future.

    Keywords: competition, Eutrophication, Sargassum horneri, temperature, Ulva prolifera

    Received: 14 Jul 2024; Accepted: 06 Sep 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Wu, Zhang, Li, Li, Pan, Yi, Xu and He. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Hailong Wu, Jiangsu Ocean Universiity, Lianyungang, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.