Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jkksz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-30T19:30:32.484Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Growth and branching patterns of Lophelia pertusa (Scleractinia) from the North Sea

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 June 2010

S.E. Gass  and
J.M. Roberts
S.E. Gass*
Affiliation:
Scottish Association for Marine Science, Dunstaffnage Marine Laboratory, Oban, Argyll, ScotlandPA37 1QA
J.M. Roberts
Affiliation:
Scottish Association for Marine Science, Dunstaffnage Marine Laboratory, Oban, Argyll, ScotlandPA37 1QA
*
Correspondence should be addressed to: S.E. Gass, Dalhousie University, Environmental Programs, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, B3H 4J1 email: susan.gass@dal.ca
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Lophelia pertusa, a cosmopolitan cold-water coral, offers potential for new palaeoclimate proxies. This study investigated its skeletal growth patterns to aid in this development. Corallite characteristics (calyx diameter, height, thecal width and banding) of L. pertusa sampled from oil platforms in the northern North Sea were examined. The mean distance between daughter polyps along a growth axis (27.4 ± 5 mm, SD) was equivalent to the estimated annual growth rate; hence, the polyps bud once a year. The majority of growth occurred in the first year when the characteristic trumpet shape of a corallite was formed, while the thecal wall thickened more consistently. Further examination of two polyps showed a dark growth band and centres of calcification along the full length of the inner theca, which represents early skeletal growth. Skeletal sampling adjacent to this area along sequential polyps shows promise as an annual chronology in these North Sea corals.

Keywords

cold-water coraldeep-sea coralpalaeo-oceanographycoral growth
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom , Volume 91 , Issue 4 , June 2011 , pp. 831 - 835
Copyright
Copyright © Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Adkins, J.F., Boyle, E.A., Curry, W.B. and Lutringer, A. (2003) Stable isotopes in deep-sea corals and a new mechanism for ‘vital effects’. Geochimica Cosmochimica Acta 67, 1129–1143.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Adkins, J.F., Henderson, G.M., Wang, S.L., O'Shea, S. and Mokadem, F. (2004) Growth rates of the deep-sea Scleractinia Desmophyllum cristagalli and Enallopsammia rostrata. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 227, 481–490.Google Scholar
Beck, J.W., Edwards, R.L., Ito, E., Taylor, F.W., Recy, J., Rougerie, F., Joannot, P. and Henin, C. (1992) Sea-surface temperature from coral skeletal strontium/calcium ratios. Science 257, 644–647.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Blamart, D., Rollion-Bard, C., Cuif, J.P., Juillet-Leclerc, A., Lutringer, A., van Weering, T.C.E. and Henriet, J.P. (2005) C and O isotopes in a deep-sea coral (Lophelia pertusa) related to skeletal microstructure. In Freiwald, A. and Roberts, J.M. (eds) Cold-water corals and ecosystems. Berlin: Springer, pp. 1005–1020.Google Scholar
Buddemeier, R.W. and Kinzie, R.A. III (1976) Coral growth. Oceanography and Marine Biology: an Annual Review 14, 183–225.Google Scholar
Cohen, A.L., Gaetani, G.A., Lundalv, T., Corliss, B.H. and George, R.Y. (2006) Compositional variability in a cold-water scleractinian, Lophelia pertusa: new insights into ‘vital effects’. Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems 7, 1–10.Google Scholar
Cuif, J.P. and Dauphin, Y. (1998) Microstructural and physico-chemical characterization of centres of calcification in septa of some recent scleractinian corals. Palaeontology Z 72, 257–270.Google Scholar
Emiliani, C., Hudson, J.H. and Shinn, E.A. (1978) Oxygen and carbon isotopic growth record in a reef coral from the Florida Keys and a deep-sea coral from Blake Plateau. Science 202, 627–628.Google Scholar
Fallon, S.J., White, J.C. and McCulloch, M.T. (2002) Porites corals as recorders of mining and environmental impacts: Misima Island, Papua New Guinea. Geochimica Cosmochimica Acta 66, 45–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Freiwald, A., Henrich, R. and Patzold, J. (1997) Anatomy of a deep-water coral reef mound from Stjernsund, west Finnmark, Northern Norway. In James, N.P. and Clarke, J.A.D. (eds) Cool water carbonates. Tulsa: Society for Sedimentary Geology, pp. 141–162.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gass, S.E. (2006) Environmental sensitivity of cold-water corals: Lophelia pertusa. PhD thesis. UHI Millennium Institute & Scottish Association for Marine Science, Oban, Scotland, UK.Google Scholar
Gass, S.E. and Roberts, J.M. (2006) The occurrence of the cold-water coral Lophelia pertusa (Scleractinia) on oil and gas platforms in the North Sea: colony growth, recruitment and environmental controls on distribution. Marine Pollution Bulletin 52, 549–559.Google Scholar
Lazier, A.V., Smith, J.E., Risk, M.J. and Schwarcz, P. (1999) The skeletal structure of Desmophyllum cristagalli: the use of deep-water corals in sclerochronology. Lethaia 32, 119–130.Google Scholar
Lutringer, A., Blamart, D., Frank, N. and Labeyrie, L. (2005) Paleotemperatures from deep-sea corals: scale effects. In Freiwald, A. and Roberts, J.M. (eds) Cold-water corals and ecosystems. Berlin: Springer, pp. 1081–1096.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maier, C., Hegemen, J., Weinbauer, M.G. and Gattuso, J.-P. (2009) Calcification of cold-water coral Lophelia pertusa under ambient and reduced pH. Biogeosciences 6, 1671–1680.Google Scholar
Mortensen, P.B. and Rapp, H.T. (1998) Oxygen and carbon isotope ratios related to growth line patterns in skeletons of Lophelia pertusa (L) (Anthozoa, Scleractinia): implications for determining of linear extension rates. Sarsia 83, 433–446.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Risk, M.J., Hall-Spencer, J. and Williams, B. (2005) Climate records from the Faroe–Shetland Channel using Lophelia pertusa (Linnaeus, 1758). In Freiwald, A. and Roberts, J.M. (eds) Cold-water corals and ecosystems. Berlin: Springer, pp. 1097–1108.Google Scholar
Roberts, J.M., Wheeler, A.J. and Freiwald, A. (2006) Reefs of the deep: the biology and geology of cold-water coral ecosystems. Science 312, 543–547.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Shen, G.T. and Boyle, E.A. (1987) Lead in corals: reconstruction of historical industrial fluxes to the surface ocean. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 82, 289–304.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Swart, P.K. (1983) Carbon and oxygen isotope fractionation in scleractinian corals: a review. Earth-Science Reviews 19, 51–80.Google Scholar
Tudhope, A.W., Chilcott, C.P., McCulloch, M.T., Cook, E.R., Chappell, J., Ellam, R.B., Lea, D.W., Lough, J.M. and Shimmield, G.B. (2001) Variability in the El Niño Southern Oscillation through a glacial–interglacial cycle. Science 291, 1511–1517.Google Scholar
Wainwright, S.A. (1964) Studies of the mineral phase of coral skeleton. Experimental Cell Research 34, 213–230.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zibrowius, H. (1984) Taxonomy in ahermatypic scleractinian corals. Palaeontographica Americana 54, 80–85.Google Scholar