Brain Meta-Transcriptomics from Harbor Seals to Infer the Role of the Microbiome and Virome in a Stranding Event.

ABSTRACT: Marine diseases are becoming more frequent, and tools for identifying pathogens and disease reservoirs are needed to help prevent and mitigate epizootics. Meta-transcriptomics provides insights into disease etiology by cataloguing and comparing sequences from suspected pathogens. This method is a powerful approach to simultaneously evaluate both the viral and bacterial communities, but few studies have applied this technique in marine systems. In 2009 seven harbor seals, Phoca vitulina, stranded along the California coast from a similar brain disease of unknown cause of death (UCD). We evaluated the differences between the virome and microbiome of UCDs and harbor seals with known causes of death. Here we determined that UCD stranded animals had no viruses in their brain tissue. However, in

SUBMITTER: Rosales SM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4668051 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature