http://news.ufl.edu/2011/10/11/coral-bacteria/

Filed under Business, Economic Impact, Environment, Florida, Research on Tuesday, October 11, 2011.

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Bacteria that could potentially help corals resist the devastating disease white pox have been found by researchers at the University of Florida and Mote Marine Laboratory.

The findings could help maintain the health of Florida’s coral reefs, which bring in billions of dollars to the state annually and are important for tourism, fisheries, shoreline protection and pharmaceutical research.

“Coral reefs are a major attraction for tourists in Florida,” said Max Teplitski, a microbiologist and an associate professor at UF’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences. “They support the economies of South Florida, and they’re also important for fisheries and, in general, healthy ecosystems.”

“Unfortunately, in the past 20 years, corals have been degrading due to global environmental changes and direct human impacts, like overfishing and other pressures,” he said. “And also, diseases have been wiping out stressed corals in South Florida.”

White pox is caused by Serratia marcescens, a bacterium that commonly occurs in feces of animals and is capable of attacking a variety of animals and plants.

To combat white pox, Teplitski and a team of researchers began studying the interactions between the pathogen that causes the malady and other microorganisms that live on corals.

Their findings are detailed in a study Teplitski co-authored in this month’s issue of The ISME Journal: Multidisciplinary Journal of Microbial Ecology.

Corals are ancient creatures that recruit microorganisms such as bacteria to protect themselves from disease. Their characteristic structure is built by animals known as polyps.

In the study, the researchers screened several hundred bacteria isolated from coral and non-coral polyps for the ability to help ward off white pox.

The researchers found four bacteria that stopped white pox disease progression under controlled laboratory conditions and, to some degree, protected the polyps from getting sick.

They also noted that polyps containing the bacteria survived white pox infection, whereas those without the bacteria died.

Based on these results, scientists may begin checking individual polyps for the presence of beneficial bacteria before introducing them into a reef system as part of coral reef restoration.

Kim Ritchie, senior scientist and manager for the marine microbiology program at Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota, said Florida’s coral reefs are some of the sickest in the world.

“They seem to be in the worst shape,” said Ritchie, a co-author of the study. “But the more we can learn about the balance of beneficial bacteria and pathogenic bacteria, the easier it will be to help the coral reefs in the Keys become healthier.”

The research was funded by sales of Protect Our Reefs specialty license plates, a statewide program administered by Mote Marine Laboratory Inc.

Study authors also include Ali Alagely, a former UF undergraduate student, and Cory Krediet, a doctoral student in the interdisciplinary ecology program at UF’s School of Natural Resources and Environment.
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The University of Florida is one of the nation’s largest public universities. A member of the Association of American Universities, UF received $619 million in sponsored research funding in 2010-11. Through its research and other activities, UF contributes more than $8.76 billion a year to Florida’s economy and is responsible for generating more than 100,000 jobs statewide. University of Florida Research; Working for Florida.
Credits

Writer
Robert H. Wells, rhwells@ufl.edu, 352-273-3569
Source
Max Teplitski, maxtep@ufl.edu, 352-273-8189
Source
Kim Ritchie, ritchie@mote.org, 941-388-4441

Special thanks to Carolyn Baker

Tracking Nonpoint Source Nitrogen Pollution in Human-Impacted Watersheds_ES&T_Oct2011-1

http://www.therecord.com/news/local/article/602635–kitchener-biologist-studying-effects-of-gulf-oil-spill

By Mirko Petricevic, Record staff

Galvez Kitchener native Fernando Galvez is an assistant professor in the biology department at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, LA.

A Kitchener biologist studying the effects of last year’s sprawling oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico isn’t worried about eating fish hauled from the contaminated region.
But he’s concerned the spill could starve future generations of wildlife in the area.

“I’m not a big seafood guy,” said Fernando Galvez, assistant professor of biological sciences at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, La. “(But) I would eat the fish in Louisiana.”

Galvez, a Kitchener native and graduate of the former St. Jerome’s high school, was part of a team of scientists whose research was published online Tuesday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the journal for the National Academy of Sciences based in Washington, D.C.

While the team didn’t detect abnormally high levels of toxins in the fish they studied, Galvez observed a surprising amount of biological damage to the fish.

“I was surprised by the level of change,” Galvez said in a telephone interview Friday. “Especially during the height of exposure there was massive damage on the gills – very inflamed. Also, there was a lot of damage to the intestines.”

The worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history started April 20, 2010, after the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded, killing 11 workers and eventually spewing 757 million litres of oil throughout the Gulf.

The disaster caused billions of dollars in damage to hundreds of kilometres of coastline.
Galvez started taking samples in various Louisiana marshes about 10 days after the spill began, but before the oil drifted into those areas. The sampling lasted for four months.
In some regions, the surface of the water was a colourful swirling mass of crude oil.
“It looked like the surface of Jupiter,” Galvez said.

Fish collected from those areas showed “no noticeable accumulation” of toxins, he said. But there were signs of biological damage triggered by the contamination, he said.
The fish’s bodies naturally metabolized the toxins, so there was no buildup. But their bodies were damaged as a result of the biological process that metabolizes the toxins, Galvez said.

He suspects small fish, as well as other species that live in the marshes, will suffer problems reproducing and that their numbers will be depleted in the long-term.
“I think the problem is in terms of population level collapses that may have effects on fisheries because of the fact that there’s less food,” he said.

He said he expects the damage will continue long-term because oil is still soaked in sediment and it’s not breaking down. Occasionally wind and waves stir up blobs of oil and work crews continue to clean up the mess.

It’s a process that can continue to contaminate wildlife for decades, he said.

The population levels of some species of fish and birds in Alaska are still depleted two decades after the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill, Galvez said.

Gilbert T. Rowe, a marine ecologist at Texas A&M University at Galveston, said examining the small fish, known as killifish, was a good choice because they are so abundant. “It’s like studying a mouse” to figure out effects on humans, he said.

Bernard Rees, a fish physiologist at the University of New Orleans, said the researchers had found an important link between oil contamination and possible physiological effects. He said the most troubling possibility for the long-term health of killifish was the chance that oil contamination harmed reproduction.

But Rees said that it was too early to know the long-term effects. “Nature has the capacity to rebound, so we’ll have to wait and see if there are any long lasting population effects.”

The research team’s article is available online at http://www.pnas.org/content/early/recent
mpetricevic@therecord.com
Special thanks to Richard Charer