Meeting Abstract

85.3  Sunday, Jan. 6  Developmental physiology: Predicting “Winners and Losers” to environmental change MANAHAN, D.T.*; HEDGECOCK, D.; Univ. Southern California; Univ. Southern California manahan@usc.edu

Physiological variance is clearly evident in the biological responses of conspecifics to changing environmental conditions. This variance cannot fully be attributed to experimental error – some of the variance likely represents underlying, genetically-determined variation in physiology and therefore a potential basis for an evolutionary adaptive response to environmental change. Understanding how developmental stages function under various scenarios of environmental change will require a merging of physiological (phenotypic), genetic, and environmental information – i.e., Phenotype = Genotype + Environment + Genotype-by-Environment Interaction. Variance in components on the right hand side of this equation could give rise to adaptive phenotypes of “Winners” regarding tolerance to environmental change. Of particular importance is the genotype-by-environment component, which heretofore has received less attention in marine larval biology but bridges genetics and physiology to provide new insights into adaptive mechanisms. We have studied genotype-by-environment interactions in larval stages of the Pacific oyster Crassostrea gigas. This species has genetic and genomic resources that are unparalleled for most marine animals and permit cross-generational experiments because of the availability of purebred lines. Contrasting larval phenotypes have been used to study the physiological, biochemical, and global gene-expression bases of potential “Winners and Losers.” Such experimental approaches offer the potential of improving predictions through a mechanistic understanding of the physiological and genetic bases of biological adaptation to changing environmental conditions.