SGER: Microbial Pathogens in Lake Pontchartrain as a Result of Hurricane Katrina Floodwaters

这个项目是由探索性研究小额拨款(SGER)资助的几项协调的海洋环境研究之一，目的是对一场自然灾害--卡特里娜飓风导致的新奥尔良洪水--做出快速反应。夏威夷大学NSF-NIEHS海洋与人类健康中心(COHH)的科学家们的这项努力是与路易斯安那州立大学巴吞鲁日分校、迈阿密大学NSF-NIEHS海洋与人类健康中心和伍兹霍尔海洋研究所的更大合作研究的一部分。飓风卡特里娜在墨西哥湾沿岸地区登陆后不久，新奥尔良地区大范围洪水泛滥，导致污水溢出和洪水污染。此后不久，这些洪水未经处理就连续注入庞恰特雷恩湖，导致污染物扩散到湖中，最终排放到墨西哥湾。多机构研究小组将通力合作，调查庞恰特雷恩湖及其附近水域被化学污染物、致病微生物和有害藻华(HAB)生物污染的程度。这项研究将记录生物和非生物污染物以及赤潮生物的水平和扩散，这些信息将对后续的建模工作有用。通过该奖项的SGER资金，伍兹霍尔海洋研究所的研究人员将对微生物病原体进行研究，这些病原体是新开发的方法和NSF-NIEHS伍兹霍尔海洋与人类健康中心研究背景下获得的新发现的产物。有三个主要目标：(1)量化洪水和沉积物中弧菌属潜在致病细菌的动态；(2)确定对人类致病的军团菌物种的存在和分布，并通过变性梯度凝胶分析检查微生物群落变化的一般动态；以及(3)利用克隆文库评估一般微生物真核和原核生物多样性，以确定与已知病原体(可能代表未知的人类病原体)相关的序列类型的存在。该方法还将识别有害的藻类物种。庞恰特雷恩湖的水和沉积物样本将与路易斯安那州立大学(LSU)的研究人员合作收集。这些样本将与迈阿密和夏威夷COHH小组的成员共享。所有这些小组之间的样本共享将促进更完整的微生物测量和分析，这是一个小组不可能单独完成的。这些信息还将被协作收集和分析，以创建一个非凡的数据集。这项快速反应研究的主要更广泛影响是，它将在自然灾害发生后提供急需的信息。污水释放的微生物可能会影响大片地区，包括庞恰特雷恩湖，随后是墨西哥湾。在这两个地区，现在和将来都有大量人口和渔业可能因接触这些化学、微生物和HAB生物体而经历急性和慢性疾病。从基础科学和公共卫生的角度来看，重要的是调查这些污染物迁移的机制和程度。

ABSTRACTOCE-0554850This project is one of several coordinated marine environmental studies funded through a Small Grant for Exploratory Research (SGER) for rapid response to a natural disaster: the flooding of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina. This effort by scientists at the NSF-NIEHS Center for Ocean and Human Health (COHH) at the University of Hawaii is part of a larger collaborative study with Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge, and with the NSF-NIEHS Centers for Oceans and Human Health at the University of Miami and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Shortly after Hurricane Katrina made landfall in the Gulf Coast Region, widespread flooding in the New Orleans area resulted in sewage overflows and contamination of floodwaters. Shortly thereafter, these floodwaters were pumped continuously into Lake Pontchartrain without treatment, resulting in the spread of contaminants into the Lake, which ultimately discharges towards the Gulf of Mexico. Working collaboratively, the multi-institutional research team will investigate the extent to which the waters in Lake Pontchartrain and vicinity have been contaminated with chemical contaminants, pathogenic microbes, and harmful algal bloom (HAB) organisms. The study will document the levels and spread of biotic and abiotic contaminants along with HAB organisms, information which will be useful for subsequent modeling efforts.With SGER funding through this award, investigators at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution will conduct studies of microbial pathogens that are an outgrowth of newly developed methods and of new findings obtained in the context of research at the NSF-NIEHS Woods Hole Center for Oceans and Human Health. There are three primary objectives: (1) to quantify the dynamics of potentially pathogenic bacteria of the genus Vibrio in the floodwaters and sediments; (2) to determine the presence and distribution of Legionella species pathogenic to humans, and examine the general dynamics of microbial community change through denaturing gradient gel analyses; and (3) to assess the general microbial eukaryotic and prokaryotic diversity using clone libraries to determine the presence of sequence types related to known pathogens (that may represent unidentified human pathogens). The approach will identify harmful algal species as well.Samples of water and sediment from Lake Pontchartrain will be collected in collaboration with researchers at Louisiana State University (LSU). These samples will be shared with members of the Miami and Hawaii COHH groups. The sharing of samples between all of these groups will facilitate more complete microbial measurements and analyses that are not possible for one group to accomplish alone. The information will also be collaboratively collected and analyzed to create a remarkable dataset. The primary broader impact of this rapid-response study is that it will provide much needed information in the aftermath of a natural disaster. The microbes released by the sewage can potentially impact a large area including Lake Pontchartrain, and subsequently the Gulf of Mexico. There are significant human populations and fisheries in both these areas that can experience acute and chronic disease from these chemical, microbial, and HAB organism exposures now and in the future. From a basic science and public health perspective, it is important to investigate the mechanisms by which and the extent to which these contaminants have migrated.