Desert Environments

Hillyard, Stanley D.; Podrabsky, Jason E.; Breukelen, Frank van

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-13362-1_4

Cited by 6 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 56 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…For this reason, A. dispar populations are now diverging without the presence of gene flow through new migrants. A similar anthropogenic impact was found for desert fish of the Colorado River area, where natural flooding occurred regularly until the construction of dams that drastically changed the water availability and had a major impact on the distribution of desert fish (Hillyard, Podrabsky, & van Breukelen, 2015).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 54%

Desert fish populations tolerate extreme salinity change to overcome hydrological constraints

Schunter

Norstog

et al. 2021

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The unstable nature of freshwater ponds in arid landscapes represent a sizable challenge for strictly aquatic organisms, such as fishes. Yet the Arabian Desert, bordering the coastline of the Red Sea, plays host to a species very well adapted to such extreme environments: the Arabian pupfish, Aphanius dispar. In this study, we estimated patterns of hydrological connectivity; population structure and stable isotope for samples of A. dispar living in small, isolated ponds of nearly-freshwater in the Arabian desert and highly saline coastal lagoons along the Red Sea. The genomic and hydrological analyses indicate that populations are largely separated by drainage origin, as fish from desert ponds appear to be transported to coastal lagoons of the Red Sea along ephemeral river systems arising from flash flood events. Further, our study indicates there is an ecological change when being washed from pond environments to coastal waters, due to a significant shift in muscle stable isotopes ratios between both groups. Considering that the genetic breaks are mostly observed between drainage origin, this study suggests that A. dispar can survive large changes in salinity and ecological regimes over small time-scales.

show abstract

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 54%

Desert fish populations tolerate extreme salinity change to overcome hydrological constraints

Schunter

Norstog

et al. 2021

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Several species of pupfish in the genus Cyprinodon inhabit warm springs of the Mojave Desert in southwestern North America where water temperatures may be as high as 33-35°C (for review, see Hillyard, 2011;Hillyard et al, 2015). Importantly, these fishes may not have spent much of their evolutionary history at these warm temperatures.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Paradoxical anaerobism in desert pupfish

Heuton

Ayala

Burg

et al. 2015

Journal of Experimental Biology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In order to estimate metabolic demands of desert pupfish for conservation purposes, we measured oxygen consumption in fish acclimated to the ecologically relevant temperatures of 28 or 33°C. For these experiments, we used fish derived from a refuge population of Devils Hole pupfish (Cyprinodon diabolis). Measurement of routine oxygen consumption (V O2,routine ) revealed some 33°C-acclimated fish (10% of 295 assayed fish) periodically exhibited periods of no measurable oxygen consumption despite available ambient oxygen tensions that were above the critical P O2 . We call this phenomenon paradoxical anaerobism. The longest observed continuous bout with no oxygen consumption was 149 min, although typical bouts were much shorter. Fish maintained normal posture and ventilation rate (>230 ventilations per minute) during paradoxical anaerobism. Fish rarely demonstrated a compensatory increase in oxygen use following a period of paradoxical anaerobism. In contrast, only one out of 262 sampled fish acclimated at 28°C spontaneously demonstrated paradoxical anaerobism. Muscle lactate concentration was not elevated during periods of paradoxical anaerobism. However, the amount of ethanol released by the 33°C-acclimated fish was 7.3 times greater than that released by the 28°C acclimation group, suggesting ethanol may be used as an alternative end product of anaerobic metabolism. Exposure to exogenous ethanol, in concentrations as low as 0.1%, produced periods of paradoxical anaerobism even in 28°C-acclimated fish.

show abstract

“…The Mojave Desert in the Southwestern United States is home to isolated systems of springs that are geothermally or ambiently heated to 28 to 33 °C and are inhabited by pupfishes in the genus Cyprinodon [ 1 ]. Previously, we demonstrated that two lineages of pupfishes reared at 33 °C frequently entered a state of paradoxical anaerobism [ 2 , 3 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The gut microbiome and its potential role in paradoxical anaerobism in pupfishes of the Mojave Desert

et al. 2020

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background: Pupfishes frequently enter paradoxical anaerobism in response to endogenously produced or exogenously supplied ethanol in a dose-dependent manner. To decipher the role of the gut microbiota in ethanolassociated paradoxical anaerobism, gut microbial communities were depleted using a cocktail of antibiotics and profiled using 16S rRNA gene sequencing. Results: Compared to the control group (n = 12), microbiota-depleted fish (n = 12) spent more time in paradoxical anaerobism. Our analysis indicated that the bacterial phyla Proteobacteria, Fusobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Firmicutes, Actinobacteria, Patescibacteria, and Dependentiae dominated the pupfish gut, which is consistent with other fish gut microbiota. Although the gut microbial communities with and without antibiotic treatment were similarly diverse, they were distinct and the greatest contribution to the dissimilarity (27.38%) was the common fish commensal Cetobacterium. Conclusions: This study reports the first characterization of gut microbial communities of pupfish and suggests the microbiome may play a critical role in regulating metabolic strategies that are critical for survival in extremes of temperature and oxygen concentration. We speculate that Cetobacterium, a primary fermenter, also consumes ethanol through secondary fermentation via an alcohol dehydrogenase and therefore regulates the transition from paradoxical anaerobism to aerobic respiration in fish. Given the wide distribution and abundance of Cetobacterium in warm-water fishes, this process may be of broad importance, and suggests that the microbiome be carefully considered for both conservation and aquaculture.

show abstract

Desert Environments

Cited by 6 publications

References 56 publications

Desert fish populations tolerate extreme salinity change to overcome hydrological constraints

Desert fish populations tolerate extreme salinity change to overcome hydrological constraints

Paradoxical anaerobism in desert pupfish

The gut microbiome and its potential role in paradoxical anaerobism in pupfishes of the Mojave Desert

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About