EFFECTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE ON GLOBAL SEAWEED COMMUNITIES
Abstract
Seaweeds are ecologically important primary producers, competitors, and ecosystem engineers that play a central role in coastal habitats ranging from kelp forests to coral reefs. Although seaweeds are known to be vulnerable to physical and chemical changes in the marine environment, the impacts of ongoing and future anthropogenic climate change in seaweed‐dominated ecosystems remain poorly understood. In this review, we describe the ways in which changes in the environment directly affect seaweeds in terms of their physiology, growth, reproduction, and survival. We consider the extent to which seaweed species may be able to respond to these changes via adaptation or migration. We also examine the extensive reshuffling of communities that is occurring as the ecological balance between competing species changes, and as top‐down control by herbivores becomes stronger or weaker. Finally, we delve into some of the ecosystem‐level responses to these changes, including changes in primary productivity, diversity, and resilience. Although there are several key areas in which ecological insight is lacking, we suggest that reasonable climate‐related hypotheses can be developed and tested based on current information. By strategically prioritizing research in the areas of complex environmental variation, multiple stressor effects, evolutionary adaptation, and population, community, and ecosystem‐level responses, we can rapidly build upon our current understanding of seaweed biology and climate change ecology to more effectively conserve and manage coastal ecosystems.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Tropical calcifying macroalgae indigenous to coral reefs are likely to be negatively impacted by ocean acidification.
“Other studies have similarly found that tropical calcifying macroalgae indigenous to coral reefs are likely to be negatively impacted by ocean acidification [58–60].”
From Ocean Acidification Accelerates the Growth of Two Bloom-Forming Macroalgae (2016) · cites this paper as [60]
Cites
Coral Reefs Under Rapid Climate Change and Ocean Acidification
Hoegh-Guldberg, O., Mumby, P. J., Hooten, A. J., Steneck, R. S., Greenfield, P., Gomez, E., Harvell, C. D., Sale, P. F., Edwards, A. J., Caldeira, K., et al. (2007) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.1152509 · Cited by 5,885 · see citing works
Atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations over the past 60 million years
Pearson, P. N., & Palmer, M. R. (2000) · Nature · doi:10.1038/35021000 · Cited by 1,771 · see citing works
Meta-analysis reveals negative yet variable effects of ocean acidification on marine organisms
Kroeker, K. J., Kordas, R. L., Crim, R. N., & Singh, G. G. (2010) · Ecology Letters · doi:10.1111/j.1461-0248.2010.01518.x · Cited by 1,621 · see citing works
Self-citationVolcanic carbon dioxide vents show ecosystem effects of ocean acidification
Hall-Spencer, J. M., Rodolfo-Metalpa, R., Martin, S., Ransome, E., Fine, M., Turner, S. M., Rowley, S. J., Tedesco, D., & Buia, M.-C. (2008) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature07051 · Cited by 1,359 · cited 1× · see citing works
“Indeed, coralline algae are relatively rare or absent from both tropical and temperate sites with naturally occurring carbon dioxide seeps (Hall-Spencer et al. 2008, Fabricius et al. 2011, Porzio et al. 2011).”
BackgroundDecreased abundance of crustose coralline algae due to ocean acidification
Kuffner, I. B., Andersson, A. J., Jokiel, P. L., Rodgers, K. S., & Mackenzie, F. T. (2008) · Nature Geoscience · doi:10.1038/ngeo100 · Cited by 561 · see citing works
Response of Mediterranean coralline algae to ocean acidification and elevated temperature
MARTIN, S., & GATTUSO, J. (2009) · Global Change Biology · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2486.2009.01874.x · Cited by 459 · cited 2× · see citing works
“…salinity (e.g., Steen 2004a), wave heights (Seymour et al. 1989, Graham et al. 1997), nutrient supply via upwelling and run-off (Lobban and Harrison 1997), pH (Kuffner et al. 2008, Martin and Gattuso 2009, Diaz-Pulido et al. 2012), and carbon dioxide concentration itself (Kroeker et al. 2010).”
BackgroundRUSSELL, B. D., THOMPSON, J. I., FALKENBERG, L. J., & CONNELL, S. D. (2009) · Global Change Biology · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2486.2009.01886.x · Cited by 281 · see citing works
Diaz‐Pulido, G., Anthony, K. R. N., Kline, D. I., Dove, S., & Hoegh‐Guldberg, O. (2012) · Journal of Phycology · doi:10.1111/j.1529-8817.2011.01084.x · Cited by 191 · cited 3× · see citing works
“…salinity (e.g., Steen 2004a), wave heights (Seymour et al. 1989, Graham et al. 1997), nutrient supply via upwelling and run-off (Lobban and Harrison 1997), pH (Kuffner et al. 2008, Martin and Gattuso 2009, Diaz-Pulido et al. 2012), and carbon dioxide concentration itself (Kroeker et al. 2010).”
BackgroundPrice, N., Hamilton, S., Tootell, J., & Smith, J. (2011) · Marine Ecology Progress Series · doi:10.3354/meps09309 · Cited by 109 · cited 1× · see citing works
“As these abiotic trends are thoroughly reviewed elsewhere (e.g., Feely et al. 2004, IPCC 2007, Rabalais et al. 2009, Wang et al. 2010, Zacharioudaki et al. 2011), we pause here only to highlight two salient features of this suite of anthropogenically forced environmental change.”
BackgroundXu, Z., Zou, D., & Gao, K. (2010) · botm · doi:10.1515/bot.2010.012 · Cited by 101 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Buschmann, A. H., Camus, C., Infante, J., Neori, A., Israel, Á., Hernández-González, M. C., Pereda, S. V., Gomez-Pinchetti, J. L., Golberg, A., Tadmor-Shalev, N., et al. (2017) · European Journal of Phycology · doi:10.1080/09670262.2017.1365175 · Cited by 767 · see citing works
Can Seaweed Farming Play a Role in Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation?
Duarte, C. M., Wu, J., Xiao, X., Bruhn, A., & Krause-Jensen, D. (2017) · Frontiers in Marine Science · doi:10.3389/fmars.2017.00100 · Cited by 680 · see citing works
Seaweeds: an opportunity for wealth and sustainable livelihood for coastal communities.
Rebours, C., Marinho-Soriano, E., Zertuche-González, J. A., Hayashi, L., Vásquez, J. A., Kradolfer, P., Soriano, G., Ugarte, R., Abreu, M. H., Bay-Larsen, I., et al. (2014) · Journal of Applied Phycology · doi:10.1007/s10811-014-0304-8 · Cited by 281 · see citing works
Prospects and challenges for industrial production of seaweed bioactives.
Hafting, J. T., Craigie, J. S., Stengel, D. B., Loureiro, R. R., Buschmann, A. H., Yarish, C., Edwards, M. D., & Critchley, A. T. (2015) · Journal of Phycology · doi:10.1111/jpy.12326 · Cited by 279 · see citing works
Noisette, F., Egilsdottir, H., Davoult, D., & Martin, S. (2013) · Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology · doi:10.1016/j.jembe.2013.07.006 · Cited by 121 · see citing works
Kim, J. K., Kraemer, G. P., & Yarish, C. (2014) · Aquaculture · doi:10.1016/j.aquaculture.2014.05.034 · Cited by 109 · see citing works
Detection and attribution of anthropogenic climate change impacts
Rosenzweig, C., & Neofotis, P. (2013) · WIREs Climate Change · doi:10.1002/wcc.209 · Cited by 99 · see citing works
Ocean Acidification Accelerates the Growth of Two Bloom-Forming Macroalgae
Young, C. S., & Gobler, C. J. (2016) · PLOS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0155152 · Cited by 83 · see citing works
- Authors
- Harley, C. D. G., Anderson, K. M., Demes, K. W., Jorve, J. P., Kordas, R. L., Coyle, T. A., & Graham, M. H.
- Affiliations
- University of British Columbia (CA)
- Moss Landing Marine Laboratories (US)
- Corresponding author
- Harley, Christopher D. G.
- ORCID
- Venue
- Journal of Phycology
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2012-09-17
- Volume
- 48
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 1064-1078
- ISSN
- 0022-3646 (ISSN-L)
- 1529-8817
- OpenAlex
- W2016949000
- Cited by
- 707
- References
- 10
- Citations by year
- 2026: 34 · 2025: 52 · 2024: 48 · 2023: 55 · 2022: 64 · 2021: 60 · 2020: 56 · 2019: 69 · 2018: 49 · 2017: 59 · 2016: 50 · 2015: 46 · 2014: 44 · 2013: 20 · 2012: 1
- FWCI
- 3.19
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Phycology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Oceanography › Marine and coastal plant biology
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Oceanography › Marine Biology and Ecology Research
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Marine Ecology and Invasive Species
- Keywords
- climate change, seaweed, seaweed communities, kelp forests, coral reefs, seaweed physiology, seaweed reproduction, species migration, adaptation, community composition, primary productivity, biodiversity, ecosystem resilience, multiple stressors, coastal ecosystem conservation
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
