Metatranscriptome analysis of the reef-building coral Orbicella faveolata indicates holobiont response to coral disease
Type
ArticleAuthors
Daniels, Camille Arian
Baumgarten, Sebastian

Yum, Lauren

Michell, Craig
Bayer, Till
Arif, Chatchanit

Roder, Cornelia
Weil, Ernesto
Voolstra, Christian R.

KAUST Department
Biological and Environmental Sciences and Engineering (BESE) DivisionMarine Science Program
Red Sea Research Center (RSRC)
Date
2015-09-11Permanent link to this record
http://hdl.handle.net/10754/577334
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Show full item recordAbstract
White Plague Disease (WPD) is implicated in coral reef decline in the Caribbean and is characterized by microbial community shifts in coral mucus and tissue. Studies thus far have focused on assessing microbial communities or the identification of specific pathogens, yet few have addressed holobiont response across metaorganism compartments in coral disease. Here, we report on the first metatranscriptomic assessment of the coral host, algal symbiont, and microbial compartment in order to survey holobiont structure and function in healthy and diseased samples from Orbicella faveolata collected at reef sites off Puerto Rico. Our data indicate holobiont-wide as well as compartment-specific responses to WPD. Gene expression changes in the diseased coral host involved proteins playing a role in innate immunity, cytoskeletal integrity, cell adhesion, oxidative stress, chemical defense, and retroelements. In contrast, the algal symbiont showed comparatively few expression changes, but of large magnitude, of genes related to stress, photosynthesis, and metal transport. Concordant with the coral host response, the bacterial compartment showed increased abundance of heat shock proteins, genes related to oxidative stress, DNA repair, and potential retroelement activity. Importantly, analysis of the expressed bacterial gene functions establishes the participation of multiple bacterial families in WPD pathogenesis and also suggests a possible involvement of viruses and/or phages in structuring the bacterial assemblage. In this study, we implement an experimental approach to partition the coral holobiont and resolve compartment- and taxa-specific responses in order to understand metaorganism function in coral disease.Citation
Metatranscriptome analysis of the reef-building coral Orbicella faveolata indicates holobiont response to coral disease 2015, 2 Frontiers in Marine SciencePublisher
Frontiers Media SAJournal
Frontiers in Marine ScienceAdditional Links
http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fmars.2015.00062Relations
Is Supplemented By:- [Bioproject]
Title: Orbicella faveolata WPD holotranscriptome sequencingPublication Date: 2015-07-14. bioproject: PRJNA289876 Handle: 10754/666546
ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.3389/fmars.2015.00062