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Seawater temperature, oxygen, salinity and pH are important abiotic factors, changes in which can generate stress in marine organisms. Subtidal and intertidal species, such as the sand dollar  Dendraster excentricus , are daily exposed to stressors against which they have developed survival mechanisms to face environmental challenges. Analysing the expression of some key genes in response to stress factors due to changes in temperature and pH, especially in the early stages of development, opens a window of knowledge on the effect that these stressors have on benthic marine organisms. In the present work larvae and post-larvae of  D. excentricus  were exposed to high temperature and low pH scenarios. Survival, size and gene expression of five genes, involved in both stress response ( hsp70 IV  and  hsp90 beta-like ) and biomineralization for skeletogenesis ( sm29 ,  sm30A ,  carbonic anhydrase 14-like  and  mitochondrial proton/calcium exchanger protein LOC575637 ), were analysed in 4-, 6-, 8-arms, competent larvae and post-larvae. Survival of stressed larvae and post-larvae presented a significant decrease, up to 37% in some stages. A size reduction of almost 30 μm was observed when larvae were exposed to stressful conditions, except in competent larvae and in post-larvae where no significant changes were detected. After stress treatments, transcripts of  hsp90 beta-like  were up-regulated in all larval stages but  hsp70 IV  transcripts were not. Under tested stressful conditions  sm29  and  sm30A  expression was down-regulated in larvae and post-larvae, while  carbonic anhydrase 14-like  and  LOC575637  expressions were up-regulated. It is evident that tolerance to changes in seawater temperature and pH has a direct effect on metabolic functions of  D. excentricus  larvae and post-larvae, which depends on the developmental stage. If laboratory results are extrapolated to marine ecosystems, it is possible that populations of this structuring organism may be disturbed with subsequent damage to ecosystem balance, until resilient organisms acclimatize and adapt to their changing habitats.

Temperature and reduced pH regulate stress and biomineralization gene expression in larvae and post-larvae of the sand dollar Dendraster excentricus