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Outcomes of Infections of Sea Anemone Aiptasia pallida with Vibrio spp. Pathogenic to Corals

  • Invertebrate Microbiology
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Abstract

Incidents of coral disease are on the rise. However, in the absence of a surrogate animal host, understanding of the interactions between coral pathogens and their hosts remains relatively limited, compared to other pathosystems of similar global importance. A tropical sea anemone, Aiptasia pallida, has been investigated as a surrogate model to study certain aspects of coral biology. Therefore, to test whether the utility of this surrogate model can be extended to study coral diseases, in the present study, we tested its susceptibility to common coral pathogens (Vibrio coralliilyticus and Vibrio shiloi) as well as polymicrobial consortia recovered from the Caribbean Yellow Band Disease (CYBD) lesions. A. pallida was susceptible to each of the tested pathogens. A. pallida responded to the pathogens with darkening of the tissues (associated with an increased melanization) and retraction of tentacles, followed by complete disintegration of polyp tissues. Loss of zooxanthellae was not observed; however, the disease progression pattern is consistent with the behavior of necrotizing pathogens. Virulence of some coral pathogens in Aiptasia was paralleled with their glycosidase activities.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by “Protect Our Reefs,” a program managed by Mote Marine Laboratory with the proceeds from the state-wide sales of Protect Our Reefs specialty license plates and administered through a peer-reviewed mechanism (to WJZ, CJK, MT, and KBR) and Dart Foundation funding (to KBR). We thank Erich Bartels for field support and Robert Camacho for assistance with infections. We are grateful to Volker Mai and Maria Ukhanova for guidance and support with the DGGE experiments. WJZ acknowledges support from the National Science Foundation Graduate Fellowship (grant no. DGE-0802270).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Microbiology and Cell Science Department, University of Florida—IFAS, Gainesville, FL, 32611, USA

    William J. Zaragoza & Max Teplitski

  2. Interdisciplinary Ecology Graduate Program, School of Natural Resources and Environment, University of Florida—IFAS, Gainesville, FL, 32610, USA

    Cory J. Krediet

  3. Soil and Water Science Department, University of Florida—IFAS, Gainesville, FL, 32611, USA

    Julie L. Meyer, Gabriela Canas, Kim B. Ritchie & Max Teplitski

  4. Mote Marine Laboratory, Sarasota, FL, 34236, USA

    Kim B. Ritchie

  5. University of Florida—IFAS, PO Box 103610, Gainesville, FL, 32610-3610, USA

    Max Teplitski

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  1. William J. Zaragoza
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Correspondence to Max Teplitski.

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Supplemental Figure 1

Symbiodinium cell counts within Aiptasia exposed to bacteria. Individual Aiptasia strain CC7 anemones were infected with either an α-proteobacterium 45A11 recovered from Symbiodinium Clade D2 (A) or the coral pathogen V. coralliilyticus (B) at three concentrations (108, 107, 106 cfu ml−1). Anemones were sampled prior to the infection (day 0) and 1, 3, and 5 days after infection. Symbiodinium cell numbers were measured by Guava flow-cytometry and were normalized to anemone protein content as described in the “Methods.” Means (N = 8) ± SEM are plotted (PDF 86 kb)

Supplemental Figure 2

DGGE analysis of A. pallida-associated microbiota following challenge with the reconstituted CYBD. Polyps infected with the reconstituted CYBD (consisting of Vibrio-like strains 1B4, 3B7, 1H5, and 2H12, previously isolated from the CYBD-affected M. faveolata) and un-infected polyps were rinsed in sterile artificial seawater, and DNA was extracted using Qiagen QIAamp Stool Kit (Qiagen, Valencia, CA, USA) following the manufacturer’s instructions. The extracted DNA was subject to PCR to amplify V6–V8 region of the 16S rRNA gene [31, 32]. DNA from the mix of the bacterial strains (Vibrio spp. 1B4, 3B7, 1H5 and Photobacterium sp. 2H12) grown overnight was treated similarly and used as a control. DGGE was conducted as before [32]. Arrows point to the bands that are present in the reconstituted CYBD and are absent from the un-infected polyps. (PDF 298 kb)

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Zaragoza, W.J., Krediet, C.J., Meyer, J.L. et al. Outcomes of Infections of Sea Anemone Aiptasia pallida with Vibrio spp. Pathogenic to Corals. Microb Ecol 68, 388–396 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00248-014-0397-2

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