From the UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI ROSENSTIEL SCHOOL OF MARINE & ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCE and the department of “let’s put some fish in a tank and gas them” comes this sub-par science fair level experiment where the only purpose seems to be to demonize CO2 by grabbng a headline. In essence, they’ve created “Dory” from the children’s movie Finding Nemo in an artificial environment that in no way is anything like conditions on a coral reef. Plus, by just dropping the fish into this elevated CO2 environment they aren’t used to, not only are they negating generations of fish and any adaptation that might occur, they are testing fish in a stressed environment that they have no experience with. This truly is bad science.
Study Links Altered Brain Chemistry, Behavioral Impairments in Fish Exposed to Elevated CO2
Research team studied damselfish behavior and physiology under ocean acidification conditions predicted for year 2300
MIAMI–In a first-of-its-kind study, researchers from the University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies at James Cook University showed that increased carbon dioxide concentrations alters brain chemistry that may lead to neurological impairment in some fish.
Understanding the impacts of increased carbon dioxide levels in the ocean, which causes the ocean to become more acidic, allows scientists to better predict how fish will be impacted by future ocean acidification conditions.
“Coral reef fish, which play a vital role in coral reef ecosystems, are already under threat from multiple human and natural stressors,” said lead author of the study Rachael Heuer, a UM Rosenstiel School alumna which conducted the study as part of her Ph.D. work. “By specifically understanding how brain and blood chemistry are linked to behavioral disruptions during CO2 exposure, we can better understand not only ‘what’ may happen during future ocean acidification scenarios, but ‘why’ it happens.”
In this study, the researchers designed and conducted a novel experiment to directly measure behavioral impairment and brain chemistry of the Spiny damselfish, (Acanthochromis polyacanthus) a fish commonly found on coral reefs in the western Pacific Ocean.
During a three-week period, the scientists collected spiny damselfish from reefs off Lizard Island located on Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. The fish were separated into two groups–those exposed to ordinary CO2 “control” conditions and those exposed to elevated CO2 levels that are predicted to occur in the near future, but have already been observed in many coastal and upwelling areas throughout the world. Following the exposure, the fish were subjected to a behavioral test, and brain and blood chemistry were measured.
The unique behavioral test, employed a two-choice flume system, where fish were given the choice between control seawater or water containing a chemical alarm cue, which they typically avoid since it represents the smell associated with an injured fish of its own species.
The researchers found that the damselfish exposed to elevated carbon dioxide levels were spending significantly more time near the chemical alarm cue than the control fish, a behavior that would be considered abnormal. The measurements of brain and blood chemistry provided further evidence that elevated CO2 caused the altered behavior of the fish.
“For the first time, physiological measurements showing altered chemistry in brain and blood have been directly linked to altered behavior in a coral reef fish,” said UM Rosenstiel School Maytag Professor of Ichthyology and lead of the RECOVER Project Martin Grosell, the senior author of the study. “Our findings support the idea that fish effectively prevent acidification of internal body fluids and tissues, but that these adjustments lead to downstream effects including impairment of neurological function.”
“If coral reef fish do not acclimate or adapt as oceans continue to acidify, many will likely experience impaired behavior that could ultimately lead to increased predation risk and to negative impacts on population structure and ecosystem function,” said Heuer, currently a postdoctoral researcher at the University of North Texas. “This research supports the growing number of studies indicating that carbon dioxide can drastically alter fish behavior, with the added benefit of providing accurate measurements to support existing hypotheses on why these impairments are occurring.”
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The study, titled “Altered brain ion gradients following compensation for elevated CO2 are linked to behavioural alternations in a coral reef fish,” was published in the Sept. 13 online issue of the journal Scientific Reports. The study’s co-authors include: Rachael Heuer; Martin Grosell; Megan J. Welch and Jodie L. Rummer and Philip L. Munday from the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies at James Cook University.
But but but how are the predators going to be able to more easily pray on these dumbed down fish when they themselves are too busy chasing their own tails? /s
Perhaps “prey” not ” pray”?
But ACGW is a religion, is it not?
lol
Some people do not believe in evolution. Just sayin’
These fish certainly don’t.
In their experience there is a Divine (by comparison) Intervener.
Perhaps they believe in a malevolent god?
A belief based on experience rather than superstition. HAHAHAHA
“Study Links Altered Brain Chemistry, Behavioral Impairments”
Well, yes it does, but not in the fish – in the “scientists” running the study!
/grin
It’s true, since the early 1990’s I’ve not found a single fish that can count up to 10.
So when they asked them to count to 10,
but answer came there none–
And this was scarcely odd, because
They’d eaten every one.
There were some COI in Japanese Deer Park that could play Poker.
https://www.kcet.org/departures-columns/animal-behaviors-japanese-village-and-deer-park-in-buena-park
Yes I know COI vs KOI I’m just being coy
That’s only because they don’t have fingers. Wait….. I’ve eaten grouper fingers so perhaps I am wrong.
How could they count to 10 without fingers?
They use their toes silly 🙂
Did they investigate any affect higher CO2 might have had on the chemical alarm cue?
Here’s a scientific study; get an ocean fish, put it in a pond inland and it will die. It’s adapted to salt water, so the fresh water will kill it.
(There’s bound to be some kind of mineral salts in that water so of course ‘fresh’ and ‘salty’ are relative).
Industrial processes put out mega-tonnes of water vapour.
Now we have the headline: Water in Ocean Will Kill Fish!
or Fish Can’t live in Water!
Or get a fresh-water fish put it in the ocean and we have the complementary headline Ocean Kills Fish! or maybe Fish Can’t Live in Ocean!
Oh my Gaaawd! I think the author’s of this drivel may have been playing that squeaky Helium voice game with the wrong stuff ! LOL
I tried to put this on the tips & notes page but that page won’t load for some reason, so thought this would be the next best place:
I came across this ridiculous study on the Australian website The Conversation…words fail me! Apparently all we need to “balance” the oceans is a bit of Feng Shui.
http://theconversation.com/our-oceans-are-out-of-balance-can-we-learn-some-tips-from-feng-shui-64975
Usually that’s because you’re running an older version of a browser or you don’t have enough memory or both
Memory shouldn’t be an issue…32 Gb on this laptop. It’s likely the browser then as is still using IE10.
I think we all know where the real brain impairment is …
There is an easy way of testing this hypothesis. there are plenty of places around the Ring of fire where there is almost neat CO2 continually bubbling up from the sea bed. Just compare the “neurological function” of species at, and distant from, RoF locations. It’ll take a big grant but that won’t matter these days. Of course, it might be simpler to survey the human residents of such locations who catch fish for sustenance. If the hypothesis was true, they would know. More bubbles = fish are dumber = easier to catch. As all these residents are supposed to be threatened by CAGW/CC the UN can pay for the study.
Here’s the paper – http://www.nature.com/articles/srep33216
1900 μatm CO2 seems a pretty high concentration
The only effect elevated CO2 levels seem to have had is to induce a state of near religious hysteria in urban green populations.
Probably not enough meat in the diet.
Don’t these people EVER get embarrassed? How do they do that? Are there special classes or something?
Omg is this really a PhD study
Anthony this is a review that Rachael Heuer wrote. It outlines the state of t research.
http://yyy.rsmas.miami.edu/groups/grosell/PDFs/2014%20Heuer%20and%20Grosell.pdf
This is the full text study you wrote about.
http://www.nature.com/articles/srep33216
You may be write in your assessment though. It seems that if you place a damsel fish in a high co2 environment and test for the parameters you get no effect. But if you let them stay there for 4 days then test them you get a reliable and consistent effect. It seems that it may well be a modification in intracellular and extracellular ion levels thus changing resting voltages and threshold voltage levels. This seems to effect the GABAa receptor in particular which is a modulator of behavior, muscles, etc. It is like they become tolerant to the effects of Xanax and thus react wrong to predators. This effect would not be seen if the changes took place slowly. NO QUESTION. I will write this up better though. There is a lot more to it. Just trying to relate to most readers. It is unbelievable the spin they try to put on this crappola IMHO!
Run the same test over a 10 year period and see if the situation is remedied through evolution. 5 generations should indicate some effect of evolution in response to tie elevated CO2 levels
There will be a physical response to different water chemistry, just looking at the “fish” is half science. The water is not the same, this is not happening to ocean water, only in experiment aquariums where every change to the set up has a big impact, because there is less water and buffers to buffer any changes.
The thing is, the authors know nothing about keeping fish in small water bodies vs large ones.
No question that some adaptation time would make a significant difference. This is seen in neural cells resting voltages and voltage gated receptor thresholds In fresh water fish slowly adapted to salt water wherein the effects are similar to the study’s results without adaptation (low salt levels though). Ill post more later
If you take a fish and change the CO2 levels, you are changing the water chemistry, and damn sure it negatively impacts the fish, you are torturing the fish. It’s sick.
The fact is with most of these fish the knowledge is very poor from a biology standpoint. Very poor. regardless of what marine biologists will tell you, most of what they say is “think” not fact.
Change water chemistry and affect the fish, it doesn’t take a genius to figure that out.
Ocean water is so stable, 400ppm CO2 from the atmosphere cannot cause any imbalances. God this is so NOT science
Fish evolved about 530 million years ago and became the dominant species in the oceans about 420 million years ago.
CO2 through this period?
7,000 ppm to 2,000 ppm.
This reminds me of the studies showing coral would go extinct when CO2 goes above 450 ppm. They evolved 540 million years ago when CO2 was 7,000 ppm.
Climate science today is ONLY based on ever more ridiculous studies claiming ever more disastrous impacts on everything. That is all that comes out today.
Having been a science guy for a long time, the instant you read in any news release “for the first time ever …” or “in a first of its kind study …”, you can immediately discount whatever is included in the study on whatever topic it is. Every single one of these studies will be proven non-factual at a later date or never amount to anything useful ever. On ANY topic in science.
When it says “for the fourth time, this study replicates previous research that …”, now you can start to think it might be a true scientific result.
‘University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies at James Cook University’
Hell of a title. Must be some law . . . the longer the title, the less likely to be of value.
Yet probably never even kept fish themselves lol. Even scientists cant keep sea horses healthy in captivity without great expense and effort, that is the level of understanding there actually is in marine biology.
Can someone remind me what percentage of free CO2 is already in the ocean?
no one knows, but a model can produce a number, anyone claiming to know is a liar
It is so dependent upon temperature that changes of 1 deg C at low temps may change the [CO2] considerably. This good video shows something very interesting about CO2 in water. And sort of answere your ?. I hope you agree.
My first question is “how long did they take to acclimate the fish to the new conditions?”
If they did it over the course of a day or two, then okay. If they plopped the fish into the tank, boosted the CO2 over the course of a minute or so, then did the test, they’re idiots. Fish can handle a pretty wide range of conditions in captivity when acclimated gradually, but they’re NOT good at sudden large changes.
For example, you can actually take many brackish-water fish species and (slowly!) get them used to fresh water, if you’re careful about it. For that matter, there are a number of fish that live in both fresh and salt water.
I would disagree. Changing the water chemistry could also change the smell of the warning scent. Something they wouldn’t notice over even the course of days, but would be trivial over the course of generations.
Humans exposed to a high CO2 atmosphere would act ‘abnormally’, i.e., they would begin to hyperventilate. If these fish behaved abnormally in a high CO2 environment, I would expect that the cause would more likely be related to lack of oxygen rather than some C02 impact on the brain.
what is a threat to fish health is big changes to CO2 levels. The study is complete BS
These people know nothing about fish, except what books tell them.
God I’ve kept aquariums and built reefs for nearly 2 decades, this is complete and utter nonsense. Junk science
The oceans cannot become acidic, there are too many inputs, several orders of magnitude greater than any process that may fight alkalinity levels.
Ocean water would be harder with higher alkalinity if there was no CO2 and the resulting H+
There is clear evidence for this, where the inputs are even greater and no offset, African lakes have calcified animals and birds on lake shores, frozen statues.
OH-
I once dropped a CO2 tank onto a fish and it DIED!
What more need be said? CO2 is dangerous!
Too funny
CO2 also has the ability to make your Big Toe talk.
I dropped a CO2 tank on my Toe and it yelled at me for several days after
Thinking of how a poor fish in a n artificial environment could be injured makes one wonder: Perhaps Sec. Clinton has developed a high sensitivity to CO2 over the years of being shut up in stuffy back rooms getting donations and political favors?
ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies at James Cook University
yeah…right…
candidate for MISnamed if ever there was one
another embarrassment for Aus
;-(
Ever tried to work out why you sprinkle salt on fish and chips?
Geoff