[A-CG41] Coastal Ecosystems -2. Coral reefs, seagrass and macroalgal beds, and mangroves

[ACG41-P01] Skeleton microstructures and in situ colony morphometry analysis of the corals collected during Tara Pacific Expedition

*Guinther Hiromu Mitushasi¹, Yuko Kitano², Emilie Boissin³, Serge Planes³, Denis Allemand⁴, Tara Pacific Consortium¹, Sylvain Agostini¹ (1.Shimoda Marine Research Center, University of Tsukuba, 2. National Institute of Environmental Science, Japan (Tsukuba), 3. CRIOBE, Universite de Perpignan (Perpignan), 4. Monaco Scientific Center (Monaco))

Keywords:Tara Pacific, P. lobata, P. meandrina, skeleton morphometry, landmark analysis

The taxonomy of scleractinian corals is still open to extensive debate due the high morphological variability among and within the numerous species. This variability can be associated with species plasticity and hybridization, phenotypic polymorphism, geographic variation and diverse environmental factors. Accurate and reproducible methods of taxonomic analysis are required for a better understanding of the distribution of coral communities and their response to climate change and anthropogenic stressors. Recent studies combining skeleton morphometry with genetic analysis have shown the relevance of landmark based skeleton morphometric analysis to identify coral species and the populations within. The Tara Pacific expedition collected more than 3000 samples from 30 different islands across two transects crossing the Pacific Ocean East-West and South-North. Three species, Porites lobata, Pocillopora meandrina and Millepora platyphylla were chosen for their relevance in the reef ecosystem and their presence across the whole Pacific. However, these species present great variations in their morphologies at both the colony and the skeleton levels making sampling and post-identification challenging. Here, we present the taxonomic identification of the corals collected during the Tara Pacific Expedition using morphometry landmark analysis of the coral colonies and their skeleton microstructures. The results will be further matched with the SNIPs based genotypes and linked with environmental and -omics data collected for the specimens.