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Gill transcriptome sequences from brook trout during consecutive heat waves in central Pennsylvania

Metadata Updated: September 13, 2025

Rapid heating events, such as heatwaves, are becoming more frequent and intense as a result of climate change. Importantly, such extreme weather events can be more important drivers of extirpation and selection than changes in annual or seasonal averages and they pose a particularly large threat to poikilothermic organisms. In this study, we evaluate the thermal stress response of a coldwater adapted fish species, the eastern brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis), to two successive heatwaves during July and August 2022. We sampled brook trout at eight time points from four streams (N=116 fish) that differed in thermal habitat, sequenced mRNA from gill samples using TagSeq, and quantified expression levels of 32,670 unique transcripts. Multivariate analyses found that overall expression patterns in response to water temperature change were similar among streams. These analyses futher detected groups of genes involved in immune response and oxygen carrier activity that were upregulated and downregulated respectively at higher temperatures. We also detected 43 genes that were differentially expressed at different time points and followed the same expression pattern during the two heatwaves. Of these genes, 42 covaried with water temperature and most (27, 62.8%) exhibited responses that varied by stream. Some of the differentially expressed genes, including heat shock proteins and cold-inducible RNA binding proteins, have been widely linked to temperature responses in experimental studies, whereas other genes we identified have functions that have not been well-studied in relationship to temperature (e.g., collagen organization) or have unknown functions. This study shows the utility of landscape transcriptomic approaches to identify important biological processes governing wild organismal responses to short-term stressors. The results of this study can guide future investigations to identify phenotypic and genetic diversity that contribute to adaptive response to heatwaves and improve predictions of how populations will respond to climate change.

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

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Dates

Metadata Created Date September 13, 2025
Metadata Updated Date September 13, 2025

Metadata Source

Harvested from DOI USGS DCAT-US

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date September 13, 2025
Metadata Updated Date September 13, 2025
Publisher U.S. Geological Survey
Maintainer
Identifier http://datainventory.doi.gov/id/dataset/usgs-0d5010f7-b4d8-45f1-ad68-b2560907c4b5
Data Last Modified 2025-05-13T00:00:00Z
Category geospatial
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 010:12
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Metadata Catalog ID https://ddi.doi.gov/usgs-data.json
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id 55de4aeb-c53a-4481-b91a-6015b7b81b67
Harvest Source Id 2b80d118-ab3a-48ba-bd93-996bbacefac2
Harvest Source Title DOI USGS DCAT-US
Metadata Type geospatial
Old Spatial -77.9100, 40.6500, -77.4600, 40.8200
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash 5ca5f171409b4651f94e12e1a31812ccbdc03d8a7f8dfd3ea8302421b83be13d
Source Schema Version 1.1
Spatial {"type": "Polygon", "coordinates": -77.9100, 40.6500, -77.9100, 40.8200, -77.4600, 40.8200, -77.4600, 40.6500, -77.9100, 40.6500}

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