datasets from Impacts of artificial light at night on the early life history of two ecosystem engineers

Sessile marine invertebrates play a vital role as ecosystem engineers and in benthic–pelagic coupling. Most benthic fauna develop through larval stages and the importance of natural light cycles for larval biology and ecology is long-established. Natural light–dark cycles regulate two of the largest ocean-scale processes that are fundamental to larvae's life cycle: the timing of broadcast spawning for successful fertilization and diel vertical migration for foraging and predator avoidance. Given the reliance on light and the ecological role of larvae, surprisingly little is known about the impacts of artificial light at night (ALAN) on the early life history of habitat-forming species. We quantified ALAN impacts on larval performance (survival, growth, development) of two cosmopolitan ecosystem engineers in temperate marine ecosystems, the mussel <i>Mytilus edulis</i> and the barnacle <i>Austrominius modestus</i>. Higher ALAN irradiance reduced survival in both species (57% and 13%, respectively). ALAN effects on development and growth were small overall, and different between species, time-points, and parentage. Our results show that ALAN adversely affects larval survival and reiterates the importance of paternal influence on offspring performance. ALAN impacts on the early life stages of ecosystem engineering species have implications not only for population viability but also the ecological communities these species support.This article is part of the theme issue ‘Light pollution in complex ecological systems’.

固着海洋无脊椎动物作为生态系统工程师（ecosystem engineers），在底栖-浮游耦合（benthic–pelagic coupling）过程中发挥着不可或缺的核心作用。绝大多数底栖动物的发育都需经历幼体阶段，而自然光周期对幼体生物学与生态学的重要性早已被学界广泛证实。自然光暗周期调控着两项海洋尺度的核心过程，这两类过程是幼体生命周期的基础：一是保障成功受精的群体广播产卵时间，二是用于觅食与躲避天敌的昼夜垂直迁移（diel vertical migration）。尽管幼体依赖光照且具备关键生态功能，但学界对夜间人工光（Artificial Light at Night, ALAN）对栖息地构建物种早期生活史的影响却知之甚少，这一点颇令人意外。我们针对温带海洋生态系统中的两类广布性生态系统工程师——紫贻贝（Mytilus edulis）与固着藤壶（Austrominius modestus），量化了夜间人工光对其幼体性能（存活、生长与发育）的影响。研究发现，较高的夜间人工光辐照度会降低两个物种的幼体存活率（分别下降57%与13%）。总体而言，夜间人工光对幼体发育与生长的影响较小，且因物种、采样时间点以及亲本血统而异。本研究结果表明，夜间人工光会对幼体存活率产生负面影响，同时再次证实了父本对子代生长性能的重要调控作用。夜间人工光对生态系统工程师物种早期生活史的影响，不仅关乎物种种群的存续能力，也会对其支撑的生态群落产生连锁效应。本文隶属于"复杂生态系统中的光污染"主题专刊。