Graduate Thesis Or Dissertation
 

How Do Parasites Infect Salmon? Comparative Transcriptomics Reveal Myxozoan Adaptations for Parasitism

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  • The phylum Cnidaria contains three main branches: Anthozoa (corals, sea anemones) Medusozoa (jellyfish, hydra), and Endocnidozoa. This latter branch is characterized by parasitism and contains the microscopic fish-parasites Myxozoa. Myxozoa are highly simplified, consisting of only a few cell types, however they have retained the nematocyst stinging cells and complex life cycles of their free-living relatives. Myxozoans utilize vertebrate (usually fish) and invertebrate (usually annelid) hosts and alternate between two discrete spore stages. Globally, myxozoan infections of fish contribute to declines in wild populations and cause economic losses in aquaculture. Whereas free-living cnidarians use nematocysts for predation or defense, myxozoan parasites use their nematocysts to attach to fish in the early stages of infection. Understanding the molecular composition of myxozoan nematocysts and associated sensory features is essential to understanding myxozoan diseases, and for designing prevention strategies against them. In free-living cnidarians, molecular components related to nematocyst discharge have been explored for decades with almost no analogous studies in Myxozoa. The application of high-throughput sequencing and bioinformatic methods has furthered understanding of the unique biology of Myxozoa, however most studies have been restricted to the fish-infection period of the life cycle that produces worm-infective stages. In this dissertation, I explore myxozoan features for infection including nematocysts, sensory devices, and venom compounds. We develop new myxozoan transcriptomic datasets from infections in both hosts and utilize a variety of bioinformatic techniques to compare these features between life stages, species, and free-living and parasitic Cnidaria.
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  • This research was supported by research grant no. IS-5001-17C from the United States-Israel Binational Agricultural Research and Development (BARD) Fund, research grant no. 2019063 from the United States-Israel Binational Science Foundation (BSF), and the Bureau of Reclamation, U.S. Department of Interior Interagency Agreement # R19PG00027. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
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