Subventions et des contributions :

Subvention ou bourse octroyée s'appliquant à plus d'un exercice financier. (2017-2018 à 2022-2023)

Biological clocks regulate many aspects of our day to day lives. These include sleep wake cycles, eating cycles and reproductive cycles. They also control large scale processes such as animal migration patterns and flowering cycles in plants. In this application we are exploring the role of biological clocks in regulating coral reproduction. Corals typically reproduce on just one evening, once per year. The timing of this process is critical as corals that spawn just a few hours early or late have very little chance of successful reproduction. Multiple environmental factors set the time of spawning. Local weather patterns determine the month, the lunar cycle determines the date and the sunset time determines the hour and minute of spawning. Our previous work has shown that the time after sunset is not controlled by a biological clock, but a large amount of preliminary data indicates clocks regulate the date of spawning. We have shown that all of the molecular components that drive biological clocks are expressed in corals as early as five days after fertilization. Our preliminary data has shown that the biological clocks of corals may shift over the course of a lunar cycle, and if confirmed will be the first example of a lunar driven molecular timer. In this proposal we describe experiments that examine the role of clocks in regulating the lunar cycle in a pacific staghorn coral. This species is widely used as a model for both ecological and molecular studies. At a field station corals will be maintained under a variety of different lunar cycles and a detailed analysis of how they respond to lunar light performed. Samples will be collected and frozen and returned to the laboratory in Canada for analysis of gene expression. These studies will not only show whether or not entrained clocks set the date of spawning, they will also identify what genes control this process at the molecular level. With worldwide coral populations in rapid decline it is essential that we know as much as possible about how corals reproduce and how we may be able to aid in their long term survival. Our studies will explore an area about which very little is known- how the moon controls the sexual reproductive cycle in these animals.