Employing biofilters to detect human pathogens in Mid-Atlantic US waters

项目摘要 在整个美国，沿海地区的人口一直在稳步增长。 此外，人类参与许多水上娱乐活动并消耗大量的水。 养殖或从沿海沃茨收获的海产品。所有这些活动都增加了多样性， 传播和传播人类病原体的可能性。不幸的是， 人类病原体在沿海沃茨的环境流行病学研究有限。工具能够 需要生成高分辨率信息来确定源、连通性和空间 这些生物在沿海环境中的分布。本项目提出了设计、优化、 以及利用一组溶液中序列捕获阵列进行病毒的靶向富集， 细菌人类病原体，以确定其多样性，分布，传播和连接， 沿海水道。两种捕获阵列都将利用现有的基因组资源来创建阵列， 其将包括共享和独特基因座的混合物。利用各种保守和可变的基因座 从这些病原体，使我们能够捕捉基因组区域有用的比较研究， （共享基因座）和种群基因组研究（独特基因座）分类群内。效率，灵敏度， 设计的捕获阵列的特异性将通过在来自 生物过滤器，这将是市场规模的牡蛎部署在下游的废水处理 设施该项目产生的数据将用于进行初步的环境 这些寄生虫类群的分子流行病学研究跨越空间和时间尺度。这 信息对于公共卫生官员做出有关健康和安全的明智决策至关重要 指人类使用、生活在沿海沃茨附近并消耗沿海水域的食物资源。

PROJECT SUMMARY Throughout the United States, human populations in coastal zones have been steadily increasing. Additionally, humans partake in many aquatic recreational activities and consume significant amounts of seafood either farmed or harvested from coastal waters. All of these activities increase the diversity, dispersal, and transmission potential of human pathogens. Unfortunately, knowledge of the environmental epidemiology of human pathogens in coastal waters is limited. Tools capable of generating high-resolution information are needed to determine the sources, connectivity, and spatial distribution of these organisms in coastal environments. This project proposes the design, optimization, and utilization of a set of in-solution sequence capture arrays to conduct targeted enrichment of viral and bacterial human pathogens to determine their diversity, distribution, dispersal, and connectivity in coastal waterways. Both capture arrays will utilize existing genomic resources to create the arrays, which will include a mixture of shared and unique loci. Using a variety of conserved and variable loci from these pathogens allows us to capture genomic regions useful for comparative studies across taxa (shared loci) and for population genomic studies (unique loci) within taxa. The efficiency, sensitivity, and specificity of the designed capture arrays will be assessed by testing these arrays on samples from biofilters, which will be market-sized oysters deployed downstream from wastewater treatment facilities. The data generated from this project will be used to conduct preliminary environmental molecular epidemiological studies on these parasite taxa across spatial and temporal scales. This information is critical for public health officials to make informed decisions about the health and safety of humans using, living near, and consuming food resources from coastal waters.