ENVICOPAS - IMPACT OF ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGES ON COASTAL PATHOGEN SYSTEMS (ENVICOPAS)

• Applicants: Professorin Dr. Ulrike Feudel; Dr. Gunnar Gerdts; Professor Dr. Matthias S. Ullrich; Dr. Mathias Wegner
• Subject Area: Ecology and Biodiversity of Animals and Ecosystems, Organismic Interactions ; Microbial Ecology and Applied Microbiology
• Term: from 2015 to 2019
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 283700004

The Marine Strategy Framework directive aims to achieve good environmental status (GES) by 2020. Monitoring health and evaluating ecological status of marine ecosystems however require descriptors. Among them, marine microorganisms infecting wildlife and humans alike are interesting models. Indeed, these pathogens might be associated with public and animal health issues notably affecting economically and ecologically important marine species such as oysters. Massive mortality of oysters are more frequently reported and have been associated with viruses, bacteria (mainly Vibrio) as well as protozoans. These alarming phenomena result from direct and indirect factors that are only partly understood. Next to pathogens oysters also host diverse communities of resident or transient microorganisms, i.e. the microbiota which can be a source of and interact with pathogens of oysters and other species including humans. The complexity of these higher order biological interactions between oysters, oyster or human pathogens and the microbiota of the host will affect the isolated effects of physical drivers as such. Investigating the direct and indirect factors of disease in such pathosystems thus appears fundamental for economic and public health reasons. The proposed project ENVICOPAS aims to investigate the dynamics of oyster and human pathogens under variable environmental physical drivers and connect these dynamics to changes observed in the oyster microbiota. The approach applied here will by far exceed the description of how these microorganism communities coexist and interact. The combination of 'in vivo/ vitro/in silico/in situ' approaches will add to our understanding of how environmental conditions are conducive to disease. The development of projective tools will further advance the prediction of dispersion of human pathogenic Vibrios in seawater, their potential accumulation by oysters and complex interactions linking pathogens of oysters and human to their microbiota under different environmental scenarios with practical implications for the development and suitability of GES indicators.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: France
• Partner Organisation: Agence Nationale de la Recherche / The French National Research Agency
• Co-Investigator: Dr. Karsten Lettmann
• Cooperation Partners: Isabelle Arzul; Dr. Laure Guillou; Maela Kloareg