Interspecific variation in hypoxia tolerance and hypoxia acclimation responses in killifish from the family Fundulidae

Abstract

Hypoxia is a pervasive stressor in aquatic environments, and both phenotypic plasticity and evolutionary adaptation could shape the ability to cope with hypoxia. We investigated evolved variation in hypoxia tolerance and the hypoxia acclimation response across fundulid killifishes that naturally experience different patterns of hypoxia exposure. We compared resting O₂ consumption rate (<i>Ṁ</i>_O₂ ), and various indices of hypoxia tolerance [critical O₂ tension (<i>P</i>_crit), regulation index (RI), O₂ tension (<i>P</i>_O₂ ) at loss of equilibrium (<i>P</i>_LOE) and time to LOE (<i>t</i>_LOE) at 0.6 kPa O₂] in <i>Fundulus confluentus</i>, <i>Fundulus diaphanus</i>, <i>Fundulus heteroclitus</i>, <i>Fundulus rathbuni</i>, <i>Lucania goodei</i> and <i>Lucania parva</i> We examined the effects of chronic (28 days) exposure to constant hypoxia (2 kPa) or nocturnal intermittent hypoxia (12 h normoxia:12 h hypoxia) in a subset of species. Some species exhibited a two-breakpoint model in <i>Ṁ</i>_O₂ caused by early, modest declines in <i>Ṁ</i>_O₂ in moderate hypoxia. We found that hypoxia tolerance varied appreciably across species: <i>F. confluentus</i> was the most tolerant (lowest <i>P</i>_LOE and <i>P</i>_crit, longest <i>t</i>_LOE), whereas <i>F. rathbuni</i> and <i>F. diaphanus</i> were the least tolerant. However, there was not a consistent pattern of interspecific variation for different indices of hypoxia tolerance, with or without taking phylogenetic relatedness into account, probably because these different indices are underlain by partially distinct mechanisms. Hypoxia acclimation generally improved hypoxia tolerance, but the magnitude of plasticity and responsiveness to different hypoxia patterns varied interspecifically. Our results therefore suggest that hypoxia tolerance is a complex trait that is best appreciated by considering multiple indices of tolerance.