Novel Molecular Approaches for Advancing Prediction and Mitigation of Disease Outbreaks in Aquaculture for Small Scale Farmers

水产养殖为全球粮食安全和减贫作出了重大贡献。在孟加拉国和印度，养虾养活了数十万穷人的生计。在印度和世界各地的发展中国家，包括孟加拉国和马拉维，鱼类养殖也是小规模养殖者生活的基础。疾病是限制水产养殖业增长的最大单一因素(全球相关年度损失估计为60亿美元)，抗击疾病对于保护小规模养殖户的生计和实现支持扶贫的水产养殖增长的国家/全球目标至关重要。该提案将开发和应用现代分子方法，作为早期预警工具，以避免低收入粮食短缺国家爆发疾病。我们的中心主题是协调农民、水产卫生专业人员、研究人员和国家主管当局的努力，以帮助避免疾病暴发。寄主生物体的疾病和健康状况不是由单个病原体单独决定的，而是由当地非生物和生物因素共同决定的，包括环境微生物群、病原体组合和宿主组织中的病原体载量。我们将应用和开发分子生物学方法，以确定与印度、孟加拉国和马拉维水产养殖池塘的主要作物物种(虾和鳍鱼)的健康状况和疾病暴发相关的池塘微生物群条件和生物学指标(生物标记物)。我们将确定池塘微生物群，这些微生物群预示着即将爆发的疾病。我们还将进一步确定微生物群与各种池塘变量的关系，包括农民目前使用的改善作物健康和提高产量的益生菌处理的使用。然后将利用这些数据开发模型，并应用于预测疾病暴发的驱动因素。我们将利用这些信息开发简单但准确的分子检测方法，供个体农场的农民使用，使他们能够通过现场监测触发的干预方法，先发制人，避免疾病事件的影响。开发一种廉价但准确的池塘/作物健康状况预警测量方法将证明一套工具/方法的概念证明，这些工具/方法可以更广泛地应用，并通过行业投资进一步开发。我们将让农民进行准确的疾病诊断，并就池塘水产养殖的微生物分子方面的管理和宿主健康的重要性对农民进行培训，并建立交流和培训网络，将项目的成果传播给其他农民、社区和与他们合作的研究中心，重点是吸引妇女参与。沟通渠道将包括移动应用程序、专注于当地的研讨会、信息视频、社交媒体和指定的项目网站。我们将评估我们的小规模农民项目对疾病缓解和作物改良的影响，采用DFID的生计框架来评估发展中国家农业技术的影响。我们的建议针对GRP水产养殖呼吁健康和营养水产养殖的优先领域，寻求了解、管理和减轻水产养殖中一些最重要的疾病，从而提高生产力，促进贫困小规模养殖户的健康和福祉。我们的建议也与GRP的恢复力水产养殖优先领域相关，因为能够预测疾病爆发将允许在疾病发生之前的较早时间点进行收获和/或其他干预措施，以防止小规模养殖户的作物损失。此外，拟议的项目还与国家研究理事会的各项战略研究优先事项以及与粮食安全和减贫有关的政府倡议有关。

Aquaculture contributes significantly to global food security and poverty reduction. In Bangladesh and India shrimp culture sustains the livelihoods of hundreds of thousand of poor people. Finfish culture too is fundamental to the lives of small scale farmers in India and in developing countries around the world, including Bangladesh and Malawi. Disease is the biggest single factor limiting growth in aquaculture (with associated annual losses estimated at >$6bn globally) and combating disease is critical for both the protection of the livelihoods of small scale farmers and for achieving national /global targets for aquaculture growth in support of poverty alleviation.The proposal will develop and apply of modern molecular methods for use as early warning tools for the avoidance of disease outbreaks in low income food deficit countries. Our central theme is the alignment of the efforts of farmers, Aquatic Health Professionals, researchers and national Competent Authorities to help avert disease outbreaks. Disease and health status of host organisms is not determined by individual pathogens alone, but by a combination of local abiotic and biotic factors including the environmental microbiome, pathogen assemblages, and pathogen loads in host tissues. We will apply and develop molecular biology methods to identify pond microbiome conditions and biological indicators ('biomarkers') associated with health status and disease outbreaks in key crop species (shrimp and finfish) in aquaculture ponds in India, Bangladesh and Malawi. We will identify pond microbiomes that signal for an impending disease outbreak. We will furthermore determine how the microbiome relates to a variety of pond variables, including the use of probiotic treatments currently used by farmers to improve crop health and increase yield. Models will then be developed using these data and applied to predict the drivers of disease outbreaks. We will use this information to develop simple but accurate molecular assays for use by farmers on individually-owned farms, enabling them to pre-empt and avoid the impacts of disease events by intervention methods triggered by monitoring carried out on-site. Development of an inexpensive but accurate early-warning measurement of pond/crop health status will demonstrate proof-of-concept for a set of tools/methods that can be applied more widely and further developed by industry investment. We will engage and train farmers in accurate disease diagnostics and in the importance of managing the microbial-molecular aspect of pond aquaculture and host health, and establish communication and training networks that will disseminate the outputs of the project to other farmers, communities, and research centres working with them, with an emphasis on engaging women. Communication conduits will include Mobile APPs, focused local workshops, information videos, social media and a designated project website. We will assess the impacts of our project for small scale farmers on disease mitigation and crop enhancements adopting DFID's Livelihood Framework for assessing the impacts of agricultural technologies in developing countries. Our proposal addresses the GRP Aquaculture Call priority areas of Healthy and nutritious aquaculture, seeking to understand, manage and mitigate for some of the most important diseases in aquaculture, in turn increasing productivity for the health and well being of poor small scale farmers. Our proposal is also relevant to the GRP priority area of resilient aquaculture as the ability to predict disease outbreaks will allow for harvesting at an earlier time point before disease onset and/or other interventions to prevent crop loss for small scale farmers. The project proposed furthermore is relevant to the strategic research priorities of various national Research Council and government initiatives relating to food security and poverty alleviation.