Suzanne Caroline Mills

Suzanne Caroline Mills
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes | EPHE · CRIOBE - Centre de Recherche Insulaire et Observatoire de l’Environnement

PhD, HDR

About

94
Publications
32,334
Reads
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4,721
Citations
Additional affiliations
January 2006 - present
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes
Position
  • Tenured Associate Professor
January 2003 - December 2007
University of California, Santa Cruz
Position
  • PostDoc Position
February 2002 - July 2006
University of Jyväskylä
Position
  • PostDoc Position

Publications

Publications (94)
Article
Full-text available
Individual exposure to stressors can induce changes in physiological stress responses through modulation of the hypothalamic–pituitary–interrenal (HPI) axis. Despite theoretical predictions, little is known about how individuals will respond to unpredictable short-lived stressors, such as thermal events. We examine the primary neuroendocrine respon...
Article
Full-text available
Introduction: Overexploitation of sharks and the destruction of their habitat has led to severe population declines and the need for conservation and management actions. Effective conservation management requires knowledge of the size at which a shark matures and an understanding of their breeding season, fundamental information to maintain appropr...
Article
Full-text available
Climate change causes extreme heat waves that have induced worldwide mass coral bleaching. The impacts of temperature‐induced bleaching events on the loss of algal endosymbionts in both corals and anemones are well documented. However, the cascading impacts of bleaching on animals that live in association with corals and anemones are understudied....
Article
Full-text available
Environmentally-induced changes in fitness are mediated by direct effects on physiology and behaviour, which are tightly linked. We investigated how predicted ocean warming (OW) and acidification (OA) affect key ecological behaviours (locomotion speed and foraging success) and metabolic rate of a keystone marine mollusc, the sea hare Stylocheilus s...
Article
Full-text available
Anthropogenic noise is an emergent ecological pollutant in both terrestrial and aquatic habitats. Human population growth, urbanisation, resource extraction, transport and motorised recreation lead to elevated noise that affects animal behaviour and physiology, impacting individual fitness. Currently, we have a poor mechanistic understanding of the...
Article
Aim The mutualistic relationship between anemones and anemonefishes is one of the most iconic examples of symbiosis. However, while anemonefishes have been extensively studied in terms of genetic connectivity, such information is lacking entirely for host sea anemones. Here, we provide the first information on the broad‐scale population structure a...
Article
Full-text available
Increased ocean temperatures are causing mass bleaching of anemones and corals in the tropics worldwide. While such heat-induced loss of algal symbionts (zooxanthellae) directly affects anemones and corals physiologically, this damage may also cascade on to other animal symbionts. Metabolic rate is an integrative physiological trait shown to relate...
Article
Full-text available
Group-living animals commonly display differences in behaviour, physiology and endocrine profiles between conspecifics within the group, which are tightly linked to reproduction. Teleosts exhibit a variety of social systems, where social status, as well as sex, has been linked to different androgen and oestrogen profiles. Levels of gonadal androgen...
Article
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Outbreaks of the coral predator Acanthaster spp., the crown-of-thorns seastar (COTS), cause major coral declines across the Indo-Pacific. However, the processes surrounding the initiation and propagation of COTS outbreaks are still unclear. We observed COTS outbreak abundances on several mid-shelf and inner-barrier reefs in the southern section of...
Article
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Human-made noise is contributing increasingly to ocean soundscapes. Its physical, physiological and behavioural effects on marine organisms are potentially widespread, but our understanding remains largely limited to intraspecific impacts. Here, we examine how motorboats affect an interspecific cleaning mutualism critical for coral reef fish health...
Article
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Organisms can behaviorally, physiologically, and morphologically adjust to environmental variation via integrative hormonal mechanisms, ultimately allowing animals to cope with environmental change. The stress response to environmental and social changes commonly promotes survival at the expense of reproduction. However, despite climate change impa...
Article
Covering: up to 2017 Chemical mediation regulates behavioral interactions between species and thus affects population structure, community organization and ecosystem function. Among marine taxa that have developed chemical mediation strategies, gastropods belong to a diverse group of molluscs found worldwide, including species with a coiled, reduce...
Article
Full-text available
Ocean warming represents a major threat to marine biota worldwide, and forecasting ecological ramifications is a high priority as atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) emissions continue to rise. Fitness of marine species relies critically on early developmental and reproductive stages, but their sensitivity to environmental stressors may be a bottlen...
Article
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The Western Indian Ocean harbors one of the world’s most diverse marine biota yet is threatened by exploitation with few conservation measures in place. Primary candidates for conservation in the region are the Scattered Islands (Îles Éparses), a group of relatively pristine and uninhabited islands in the Mozambique Channel. However, while optimal...
Article
Full-text available
Some anthropogenic noise is now considered pollution, with evidence building that noise from human activities such as transportation, construction and exploration can impact behaviour and physiology in a broad range of taxa. However, relatively little research has considered the effects of repeated or chronic noise; extended exposures may result in...
Article
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Ecosystems are commonly affected by natural, episodic disturbances that can abruptly and drastically alter communities. Although it has been shown that resilient ecosystems can eventually recover to pre-disturbed states, the extent to which communities in early stages of recovery could be affected by multiple anthropogenic stressors is poorly under...
Article
Full-text available
Conflict between mates, as well as conflict between parents and offspring are due to divergent evolutionary interests of the interacting individuals. Hormone systems provide genetically based proximate mechanisms for mediating phenotypic adaptation and maladaptation characteristic of evolutionary conflict between individuals. Testosterone (T) is am...
Poster
Full-text available
In the lagoon of Moorea, Lyngbya majuscula blooms ephemerally scudding across wide area. It is an occasionally toxic filamentous cyanobacterium, present in worldwide tropical and subtropical warm waters. L. majuscula is responsible of severe human injuries like dermatoses. This cyanobacterium is a rich source of bioactive compounds like tiahuramide...
Article
Full-text available
Outbreaks of the corallivorous crown-of-thorns seastar Acanthaster planci (COTS) represent one of the greatest disturbances to coral reef ecosystems in the Indo-Pacific, affecting not only coral reefs but also the coastal communities which rely on their resources. While injection approaches are increasingly used in an attempt to control COTS densit...
Article
Full-text available
Understanding the role of predators in food webs can be challenging in highly diverse predator/prey systems composed of small cryptic species. DNA based dietary analysis can supplement predator removal experiments and provide high resolution for prey identification. Here we use a metabarcoding approach to provide initial insights into the diet and...
Article
Full-text available
Coral reefs are in decline across the globe as a result of overexploitation, pollution, disease and, more recently, climate change. The impacts of changes in coral cover on associated fish communities can be difficult to predict because of the uneven dependence of reef fish species on corals for food, shelter or the three-dimensional structure they...
Article
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Adult crabs are known to play critical roles in the survival of their adult coral hosts, but little is known of the mutualism between juvenile crabs (≤0.5 cm) and their juvenile hosts. Field and laboratory experiments both demonstrated that the presence of juvenile crabs of the genus Trapezia in young host Pocillopora corals (2 to 3 cm diameter) in...
Chapter
Full-text available
This chapter introduces the bank vole, Myodes glareolus, and discusses the environmental fluctuations to which the species is subjected. It then outlines its mating system, the heritability and reliability of male signals and intralocus sexual conflict. The chapter then describes the presence of genotype by environment interactions (GEI) for male d...
Article
Full-text available
Human activities can create noise pollution and there is increasing international concern about how this may impact wildlife. There is evidence that anthropogenic noise may have detrimental effects on behaviour and physiology in many species but there are few examples of experiments showing how fitness may be directly affected. Here we use a split-...
Article
Full-text available
Introduction The PCR-based analysis of homologous genes has become one of the most powerful approaches for species detection and identification, particularly with the recent availability of Next Generation Sequencing platforms (NGS) making it possible to identify species composition from a broad range of environmental samples. Identifying species f...
Article
Full-text available
Characterization of predator-prey interactions is challenging as researchers have to rely on indirect methods that can be costly, biased and too imprecise to elucidate the complexity of food webs. DNA amplification and sequencing techniques of gut and fecal contents are promising approaches, but their success largely depends on the ability to ampli...
Data
Effect of bacteria co-amplification on the number of prey Operational Taxonomic Units (OTUs) recovered from fish gut contents. Symbols and colors represent COI primer set (“COI” – square; “dgCOI” – triangle) and predator species (Neocirrhites armatus – red; Paracirrhites arcatus – blue). (TIF)
Data
Cutting frequency of commercially available restriction enzymes across ≈330 decapod taxa (947 sequences), ≈430 ray-finned fish taxa (758 sequences) and ≈170 gastropod taxa (271 sequences). (DOCX)
Data
Sample based rarefaction curves for the number of prey species as a function of the number of samples. Samples represent clone libraries obtained from fish gut contents. Lower and upper lines represent 95% CI. Photo credit: Thomas Vignaud. (TIF)
Data
Test for the correlation between the % of bacterial sequence in clone libraries and the number of prey OTUs. (DOCX)
Article
Full-text available
During a survey of the population of blacktip reef shark Carcharhinus melanopterus in Moorea (French Polynesia) between 2007 and 2011, population structural characteristics were estimated from 268 individuals. Total length (L ) ranged from 48 to 139 cm and 48 to 157 cm for males and females, respectively, demonstrating that the average L of females...
Article
Full-text available
Killing conspecifi c infants (infanticide) is among the most puzzling phenomena in nature. Stable polymorphism in such behaviour could be maintained by negative frequency-dependent selection (benefi t of rare types). However, it is currently unknown whether there is genetic polymorphism in infanticidal behaviour or whether infanticide may have any...
Article
Full-text available
Identifying species involved in consumer–resource interactions is one of the main limitations in the construction of food webs. DNA barcoding of prey items in predator guts provides a valuable tool for characterizing trophic interactions, but the method relies on the availability of reference sequences to which prey sequences can be matched. In thi...
Article
Full-text available
The density-dependent prophylaxis hypothesis predicts that individuals at high density will invest more resources into immune defence than individuals at lower densities as a counter-measure to density-dependent pathogen transmission rates. Evidence has been found for this hypothesis in insects, but not in a non-arthropod taxon. To investigate this...
Article
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The post-larval supply of two crustacean taxa (Brachyura and Stomatopoda) was monitored using one crest net over three lunar months at Rangiroa Atoll, French Polynesia. We captured a total of 37,068 brachyuran and 12,697 stomatopod post-larvae during the study. Post-larval supply was higher during the warm season (February–April) than during the co...
Article
Full-text available
The present study describes ontogenetic shifts in habitat use for 15 species of coral reef fish at Rangiroa Atoll, French Polynesia. The distribution of fish in different habitats at three ontogenetic stages (new settler, juvenile, and adult) was investigated in coral-dominated and algal-dominated sites at two reefs (fringing reef and inner reef of...
Article
Full-text available
Although benthic motile invertebrate communities encompass the vast majority of coral reef diversity, their response to habitat modification has been poorly studied. A variety of benthic species, particularly decapods, provide benefits to their coral host enabling them to cope with environmental stressors, and as a result benefit the overall divers...
Data
Completeness of species sampling effort. Rarefaction curves for the number of coral obligate (A) and non-obligate (B) species as a function of the number of sampled non-eaten (light grey line), partially eaten (grey line) and completely dead (black line) Pocillopora eydouxi corals; 95% confidence intervals are plotted for each curve (dashed lines)....
Data
Description and validation of sampling methodology. (DOCX)
Data
Photographs of decapods sampled in Pocillopora eydouxi coral from Moorea. A) Trapezia areolata, B) Trapezia serenei, C) Cymo quadrilobatus, D) Alpheus lottini, E) Harpiliopsis depressa, F) Fennera chacei, G) Nucia rosea, H) Neostylodactylus cf. littoralis, and I) Liomera striolata. (TIF)
Article
Full-text available
Mutualisms often involve one host supporting multiple symbionts, whose identity, density and intraguild interactions can influence the nature of the mutualism and performance of the host. However, the implications of multiple co-occurring symbionts on services to a host have rarely been quantified. In this study, we quantified effects of decapod sy...
Data
The diversity of crustacean communities increases with total abundance. Here we show the abundance-diversity relationship extracted from papers on communities inhabiting Pocillopora damicornis [43] (red - a), Stylophora pistillata [44] (green – b), and our study in Pocillopora cf. verrucosa (blue - c). Each point gives the species richness and abun...
Data
Abundance of individuals within a given species across all 133 corals for top five focal species of exosymbiont. Simulation quantiles represent 95% confidence interval from 10,000 randomly generated communities. (DOC)
Data
Frequency of species richness on 133 surveyed corals for top five focal exosymbionts (Trapezia serenei, Alpheus lottini, Synalpheus charon, T. bidentata, T. punctimanus). Black circles and solid line represent the observed data. Purple rectangle and dashed line represent the 95% quantiles of richness from 10,000 randomly simulated communities. Pair...
Data
Species list, number of corals occupied, and total abundance of exosymbionts from Alpheidae and Trapeziidae from surveys of 133 corals. (DOC)
Data
Occurrence and co-occurrence patterns of five focal species (Trapezia serenei, Alpheus lottini, Synalpheus charon, T. bidentata, T. punctimanus) on 133 surveyed reefs. Simulation quantiles represent 95% confidence interval from 10,000 randomly generated communities. (DOC)
Data
Panel A shows a Pocillopora coral being transported in a plastic container. After the coral was transferred to the red plastic grid, the container was placed underneath the grid to capture sediment removed by the coral and exosymbionts. Panel B shows a close up of a replicate coral with both Trapezia serenei (top) and Alpheus lottini (bottom). (TIF...
Article
Full-text available
Killing conspecific infants (infanticide) is among the most puzzling phenomena in nature. Stable polymorphism in such behaviour could be maintained by negative frequency-dependent selection (benefit of rare types). However, it is currently unknown whether there is genetic polymorphism in infanticidal behaviour or whether infanticide may have any fi...
Article
Full-text available
Intralocus sexual conflict occurs when a trait encoded by the same genetic locus in the two sexes has different optima in males and females. Such conflict is widespread across taxa, however, the shared phenotypic traits that mediate the conflict are largely unknown. We examined whether the sex hormone, testosterone (T), that controls sexual differe...
Article
Full-text available
Sexually antagonistic genetic variation, where optimal values of traits are sex-dependent, is known to slow the loss of genetic variance associated with directional selection on fitness-related traits. However, sexual antagonism alone is not sufficient to maintain variation indefinitely. Selection of rare forms within the sexes can help to conserve...
Article
Full-text available
1. The persistence of multiple mating remains one of the fundamental questions in evolutionary biology. In theory, multiple mating is predicted to improve female fitness cumulatively through direct and/or genetic benefits. However, intra-locus sexual conflicts may potentially constrain or even eliminate these benefits owing to the gender load impos...
Article
Full-text available
Animals use sensory stimuli either to assess and select habitats, mates or food, as well as for communication. The present study aimed to understand the behavioural processes enabling several Chaetodon species (butterflyfishes) to locate one of their food sources (epibionts present on pearl oyster shells) at Rangiroa atoll (French Polynesia). Among...
Article
Full-text available
Parasites indirectly affect life-history evolution of most species. Combating parasites requires costly immune defenses that are assumed to trade off with other life-history traits. In vertebrate males, immune defense is thought to trade off with reproductive success, as androgens enhancing sexual signaling can suppress immunity. The phenotypic rel...
Article
Full-text available
Commercially available enzyme immunoassay (EIA) kits were validated for measuring steroid hormone concentrations in blood plasma from three fish species: the orange clownfish Amphiprion percula, the orangefin anemonefish Amphiprion chrysopterus and the blacktip reef shark Carcharhinus melanopterus. A minimum of 5 microl plasma was required to estim...
Article
Full-text available
Cheating is common in cooperative interactions, but its occurrence can be controlled by various means ranging from rewarding cooperators to active punishment of cheaters. Punishment occurs in the mutualism involving the cleanerfish Labroides dimidiatus and its reef fish clients. When L. dimidiatus cheats, by taking scales and mucus rather than ecto...
Article
Full-text available
Colour polymorphism is widespread in animals but, in contrast to other types of poly- morphism, has been little explored during ontogeny. Among coral reef fish, the surge damselfish Chrysiptera leucopoma settles in the larval stage as a yellow morph, whereas 2 colour morphs (yellow and brown) are apparent in adults at Rangiroa Atoll, French Polynes...
Article
Full-text available
Animals use sensory stimuli to assess and select habitats, mates, and food as well as to communicate with other individuals. One of the great mysteries of crustacean ecology is how postlarvae locate the relatively rare patches of coral reef habitat on which they settle. The present study aimed to estimate, by experiments in aquaria and biochemical...
Article
Full-text available
Trade-offs are widespread between life-history traits, such as reproduction and survival. However, their underlying physiological and behavioral mechanisms are less clear. One proposed physiological factor involves the trade-off between investment in male reproductive effort and immunity. Based on this hypothesis, we investigated differences in fit...
Article
Full-text available
This study explored how mortality processes influence life history traits of recently set- tled juvenile fishes (Diplodus vulgaris and D. sargus) in the Mediterranean. Mortality was estimated by measuring the decrease in abundance of a cohort from settlement to 4 mo post-settlement. Growth and parasite load were simultaneously measured over time to...