Mo’orea Project Background

This project is a part of LTER Network. Mo’orea is a part of French Polynesia. The coral reef in the northern region of the island was adversely affected by two natural events. However, over time the reef came back to a healthy state.
In order to understand re-colonization of these regions this project has multiple layers.

1. Studying re colonization patterns in this region has long term and broad applications associated with climate change.
2. Study sites vary in type of water dynamics, depth and temperature conditions. As such understanding the colonization patterns in light of these environmental variables has applications associated with rising water temperatures and climate change.

   Goal

3. Use ddRAD to understand population dynamics across sampling sites
4. Use epiRAD along with ddRAD to understand epigenetic patterns with respect to habitat variables

   Study site

   

   Sampling

   8 sites sampled with up to 15 samples of Porites (lobata/lutea) and Pocillopora (meandrina/verrucosa) per site.

   Sequencing

   ddRAD and epiRAD with a methylation sensitive restriction enzyme used in epiRAD (Schield et al. 2016).