The Genetics of Innate Immunity and Disease Resistance in Reef-Building Corals

造礁珊瑚的先天免疫和抗病性遗传学

• 批准号: 0848345
• 负责人: Steven Vollmer
• 金额: $ 44.03万
• 依托单位: Northeastern University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-06-15 至 2013-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0848345&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Genetics; Innate; Immunity; Disease; Resistance

"This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5)."The global emergence of infectious diseases has radically altered marine ecosystems, especially tropical reef communities. Reef-building corals, the cornerstones of tropical reefs, have been especially hard hit. A prime example is White Band Disease (WBD) on the Caribbean Acropora corals, the staghorn coral A. cervicornis and elkhorn coral A. palmata, which caused an unprecedented die-off of these dominant shallow-water corals, and spurred their threatened listings on the USA Endangered Species Act (ESA). While significant inroads have been made towards understanding the basic etiology and ecology, for many coral diseases including WBD, little to nothing is known about the genetic response of the coral host during disease exposure and the genetic basis of natural disease resistance in corals, even though this knowledge is fundamental to understanding coral host-pathogen interactions and critical to the conservation of these threatened corals. Using the Caribbean staghorn coral A. cervicornis and WBD as the host-pathogen system, this study will produce the first experimental data on the genetics of disease infection, innate immunity and host resistance in reef-building corals. In situ transmission experiments will identify resistant and susceptible staghorn corals. A transcriptome-wide survey of resistant and susceptible corals exposed to WBD will identify genes that are differentially expressed (i.e. up or down regulated) when corals are exposed to disease, and identify gene expression patterns that differ between resistant and susceptible staghorn corals. A survey of the staghorn coral genome will then be used to identify genetic markers associated with WBD resistance, and survey the frequencies of these resistance markers in remnant staghorn coral populations from across the Caribbean. These transcriptome and genome surveys will provide a comprehensive picture of coral gene regulation during disease exposure and the genetic mechanisms underlying natural disease resistance. The broader impacts include outreach efforts through journal publication and media outlets to capture the public's awareness on topic of the natural disease resistance in an ESA listed coral. Field and laboratory training and experiences are planned for multiple graduate and undergraduate students. Curricula will be developed to teach students about genes, DNA and coral reef health in both English and Spanish, and the materials will be distributed to teachers in the US and Panama. The transcriptome sequence data and microarray platform will be freely available to the scientific community as an open resource. In addition, this research will advance knowledge of the genes involved in coral disease exposure, innate immunity and host-resistance, while providing conservation managers in the Caribbean the first information on natural disease resistance in a threatened coral and a genetic tool for surveying the future resilience of staghorn corals populations to WBD.

这个奖项是根据2009年美国复苏和再投资法案(公法111-5)资助的。全球传染病的出现从根本上改变了海洋生态系统，特别是热带珊瑚礁社区。建造珊瑚礁的珊瑚是热带珊瑚礁的基石，受到的打击尤其严重。一个最好的例子是加勒比海顶孔珊瑚、鹿角珊瑚和鹿角珊瑚上的白带病(WBD)，它导致这些优势浅水珊瑚史无前例的灭绝，并促使它们被列入美国濒危物种法案(ESA)。虽然在理解基本病因学和生态学方面取得了重大进展，但对于包括WBD在内的许多珊瑚疾病，人们对疾病暴露期间珊瑚宿主的遗传反应和珊瑚自然抗病的遗传基础知之甚少，尽管这种知识是理解珊瑚宿主-病原体相互作用的基础，对保护这些受到威胁的珊瑚至关重要。以加勒比海鹿角珊瑚和WBD作为宿主-病原体系统，这项研究将首次产生关于造礁珊瑚疾病感染、先天免疫和宿主抵抗力的遗传学实验数据。原位传播实验将识别抵抗和敏感的鹿角珊瑚。对暴露于WBD的抗性和敏感珊瑚进行的转录组调查将确定珊瑚暴露在疾病中时差异表达的基因(即上调或下调)，并确定抗性和敏感鹿角珊瑚之间的不同基因表达模式。随后将对鹿角珊瑚基因组进行调查，以确定与WBD抗性相关的遗传标记，并调查加勒比地区残留的鹿角珊瑚种群中这些抗性标记的频率。这些转录组和基因组调查将提供珊瑚在疾病暴露期间的基因调控和自然疾病抗性背后的遗传机制的全面图景。更广泛的影响包括通过期刊出版物和媒体渠道进行外联努力，以捕捉公众对欧空局列入名单的珊瑚的自然抗病主题的认识。计划为多名研究生和本科生提供现场和实验室培训和经验。将开发课程，用英语和西班牙语向学生传授基因、DNA和珊瑚礁健康知识，这些材料将分发给美国和巴拿马的教师。转录组序列数据和微阵列平台将作为开放资源免费提供给科学界。此外，这项研究将促进对与珊瑚疾病暴露、先天免疫和宿主抗性有关的基因的了解，同时为加勒比地区的保护管理者提供关于受威胁珊瑚的自然抗病能力的第一批信息，并提供一个基因工具，用于调查鹿角珊瑚种群未来对WBD的适应能力。