Climate change tightens a metabolic constraint on marine habitats
Abstract
Warming of the oceans and consequent loss of dissolved oxygen (O2) will alter marine ecosystems, but a mechanistic framework to predict the impact of multiple stressors on viable habitat is lacking. Here, we integrate physiological, climatic, and biogeographic data to calibrate and then map a key metabolic index-the ratio of O2 supply to resting metabolic O2 demand-across geographic ranges of several marine ectotherms. These species differ in thermal and hypoxic tolerances, but their contemporary distributions are all bounded at the equatorward edge by a minimum metabolic index of ~2 to 5, indicative of a critical energetic requirement for organismal activity. The combined effects of warming and O2 loss this century are projected to reduce the upper ocean's metabolic index by ~20% globally and by ~50% in northern high-latitude regions, forcing poleward and vertical contraction of metabolically viable habitats and species ranges.
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Thermal and oxygen conditions that produce energy limitation and fitness reduction for a given species may correspond to the species' distributional limits.
“Hence, thermal and oxygen conditions that produce energy limitation and fitness reduction for a given species may correspond to the species' distributional limits (Deutsch et al., 2015;Sokolova, 2013).”
From Warming and hypoxia reduce the performance and survival of northern bay scallops (<i>Argopecten irradians irradians</i>) amid a fishery collapse (2023) · cites this paper as Deutsch et al., 2015
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Effects of Size and Temperature on Metabolic Rate
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Declining oxygen in the global ocean and coastal waters
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Self-citationImpacts of hypoxic events surpass those of future ocean warming and acidification
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“Hence, thermal and oxygen conditions that produce energy limitation and fitness reduction for a given species may correspond to the species' distributional limits (Deutsch et al., 2015; Sokolova, 2013).”
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What the geological past can tell us about the future of the ocean’s twilight zone
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- Authors
- Deutsch, C., Ferrel, A., Seibel, B., Pörtner, H.-O., & Huey, R. B.
- Affiliations
- University of Washington (US)
- University of California, Los Angeles (US)
- University of Rhode Island (US)
- Alfred-Wegener-Institut Helmholtz-Zentrum für Polar- und Meeresforschung (DE)
- Corresponding author
- Deutsch, Curtis
- Venue
- Science
- Published
- 2015-06-05
- Volume
- 348
- Issue
- 6239
- Pages
- 1132-1135
- ISSN
- 0036-8075 (ISSN-L)
- 1095-9203
- OpenAlex
- W1685251144
- Cited by
- 747
- References
- 1
- Citations by year
- 2026: 66 · 2025: 52 · 2024: 81 · 2023: 102 · 2022: 78 · 2021: 67 · 2020: 71 · 2019: 57 · 2018: 60 · 2017: 43 · 2016: 51 · 2015: 19
- FWCI
- 52.18
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Digital Commons - University of South Florida (University of South Florida) (submittedVersion)
- Helmholtz-Zentrum für Polar-und Meeresforschung (Alfred-Wegener-Institut) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation (OCE-1419323, OCE-1458967, OCE-1459243, ID 1038016)
- Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation (GBMF3775)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Physiological and biochemical adaptations
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Marine and fisheries research
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Oceanography › Marine Biology and Ecology Research
- Keywords
- climate change, ocean warming, ocean deoxygenation, hypoxia, metabolic index, resting metabolic rate, dissolved oxygen supply, marine ectotherms, range shifts, multiple stressors, heat tolerance, high-latitude ecosystems, biogeography
- MeSH terms
- Anaerobiosis, Animals, Brachyura, Oceans and Seas, Oxygen, Perciformes, Ecosystem, Sea Bream, Gadus morhua, Climate Change, Aquatic Organisms
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