Over the past decades, three major challenges to marine life have emerged as a consequence of anthropogenic emissions: ocean warming, acidification and oxygen loss. While most experimental research has targeted the first two stressors, the last remains comparatively neglected. Here, we implemented sequential hierarchical mixed-model meta-analyses (721 control–treatment comparisons) to compare the impacts of oxygen conditions associated with the current and continuously intensifying hypoxic events (1–3.5 O₂ mg l⁻¹) with those experimentally yielded by ocean warming (+4 °C) and acidification (−0.4 units) conditions on the basis of IPCC projections (RCP 8.5) for 2100. In contrast to warming and acidification, hypoxic events elicited consistent negative effects relative to control biological performance—survival (–33%), abundance (–65%), development (–51%), metabolism (–33%), growth (–24%) and reproduction (–39%)—across the taxonomic groups (mollusks, crustaceans and fish), ontogenetic stages and climate regions studied. Our findings call for a refocus of global change experimental studies, integrating oxygen concentration drivers as a key factor of ocean change. Given potential combined effects, multistressor designs including gradual and extreme changes are further warranted to fully disclose the future impacts of ocean oxygen loss, warming and acidification.

在过去的几十年里，由于人为排放，海洋生物面临三大挑战：海洋变暖、酸化和氧气流失。虽然大多数实验研究都针对前两个压力因素，但最后一个因素仍然相对被忽视。在这里，我们实施了顺序分层混合模型荟萃分析（721 对照-治疗比较）来比较与当前和持续加剧的缺氧事件相关的氧气条件的影响（1-3.5 O ₂  mg l ^-1) 与根据 IPCC 预测 (RCP 8.5) 对 2100 年海洋变暖 (+4 °C) 和酸化 (-0.4 单位) 条件实验产生的那些。与变暖和酸化相反，缺氧事件引发了相对于控制生物性能——生存 (–33%)、丰度 (–65%)、发育 (–51%)、新陈代谢 (–33%)、生长 (–24%) 和繁殖 (–39%)——跨分类群（软体动物、甲壳类动物和鱼类）、个体发育阶段和气候区域进行了研究。我们的研究结果呼吁重新关注全球变化实验研究，将氧气浓度驱动因素作为海洋变化的关键因素。考虑到潜在的综合影响，包括渐变和极端变化在内的多应力源设计进一步保证充分揭示海洋氧气流失的未来影响，