Food supply confers calcifiers resistance to ocean acidification

Invasion of ocean surface waters by anthropogenic CO emitted to the atmosphere is expected to reduce surface seawater pH to 7.8 by the end of this century compromising marine calcifiers. A broad range of biological and mineralogical mechanisms allow marine calcifiers to cope with ocean acidification, however these mechanisms are energetically demanding which affect other biological processes (trade-offs) with important implications for the resilience of the organisms against stressful conditions. Hence, food availability may play a critical role in determining the resistance of calcifiers to OA. Here we show, based on a meta-analysis of existing experimental results assessing the role of food supply in the response of organisms to OA, that food supply consistently confers calcifiers resistance to ocean acidification.This work was funded by grants from the Danish Environmental Protection Agency within the Danish 486 Cooperation for Environment in the Arctic (DANCEA), ASSEMBLE grant agreement no. 227799 from European Community and from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (ESTRESX, number CTM2012-32603). N.A.L. acknowledges support from grants Fondecyt 1140938 and NC 1200286 (Millennium Nucleus Project MUSELS) and L.R. was supported by BECAS CHILE fellowship program from Comisión Nacional de Investigación Científica y Tecnológica de Chile (CONICYT)Peer Reviewe