Maternal effects in gene expression of interspecific coral hybrids

Parental coral colonies of A. tenuis and A. loripes were collected from Trunk Reef on the central Great Barrier Reef in November 2015. During spawning, four offspring groups (i.e., reciprocal F1 hybrids and two parental purebreds: TT (purebred A. tenuis), TL (hybrid), LT (hybrid) and LL (purebred A. loripes), were recruited and settled onto ceramic plugs. Detailed crossing protocol and experimental design is described in Chan et al. (2018).

Coral recruits were reared under treatment conditions in filtered seawater for seven months at the National Sea Simulator of the Australian Institute of Marine Science. Treatment conditions included exposure to ambient or elevated temperature and pCO2 conditions:

ambient conditions (27ºC and 415 ppm pCO2)

elevated conditions (ambient +1 °C and 685 ppm pCO2)

RNA-sequencing was conducted and the analysis showed that gene expression of the hybrid Acropora also showed clear maternal effects. Further details are presented in the paper Chan, WY, Chung, J, Peplow, LM, Hoffmann, AA, van Oppen, MJH. Maternal effects in gene expression of interspecific coral hybrids. Mol Ecol. 2021; 30: 517– 527. https://doi.org/10.1111/mec.15727

2015年11月，研究人员从大堡礁（Great Barrier Reef）中部的特兰克礁（Trunk Reef）采集了*Acropora tenuis*（简称A. tenuis）与*Acropora loripes*（简称A. loripes）的亲本珊瑚群体。产卵期内，研究人员获得四组后代：即正反交F1杂种及两个亲本纯种——TT（纯种*A. tenuis*）、TL（杂种）、LT（杂种）与LL（纯种*A. loripes*），并将所有幼体定植于陶瓷塞上。详细的杂交流程与实验设计详见Chan等人2018年的研究。

珊瑚幼体在澳大利亚海洋科学研究所（Australian Institute of Marine Science）国家海洋模拟器（National Sea Simulator）的过滤海水中，于处理条件下饲养7个月。处理条件涵盖常温/升温与正常/高二氧化碳分压（pCO2）环境，具体如下：
- 常温对照组：27℃、415 ppm pCO2
- 升温实验组：较常温高1℃、685 ppm pCO2

随后对样本开展RNA测序（RNA-sequencing）分析，结果显示杂种鹿角珊瑚的基因表达同样存在显著的母本效应。该研究的详细内容见于Chan WY、Chung J、Peplow LM、Hoffmann AA、van Oppen MJH发表于《分子生态学（*Molecular Ecology*）》2021年第30卷，第517至527页的论文《种间珊瑚杂种基因表达的母本效应》，DOI: 10.1111/mec.15727