NOAA Sea Grant
Aspergillosis of Sea Fans in a Global Context Grant No. R-92-2-08 PI: Paul Bayman, PhD Co-PI: Alberto M. Sabat, PhD University of Puerto Rico – Río Piedras
FINAL REPORT Chapter 1: Executive Summary A one-year no-cost extension of this project was requested and granted. This Report covers work done during the project and during the no-cost extension, as of 28 February 2011. Several aspects of the projects are on-going, so further findings and publications are expected. This summary is structured around the objectives and hypotheses presented in the original proposal. To distinguish parts cited from the original proposal, they appear here in blue text. Objective 1. Compare genetic compositions of populations from Aspergillus sydowii and A. flavus in sea fans with populations in sea water, river water, soil and airborne dust using AFLPs. Hypotheses: 1. Marine and terrestrial strains of A. flavus and A. sydowii will not comprise genetically distinct populations. 2. Strains from sea fans in Puerto Rico will be genetically more similar to strains from soil in Puerto Rico than strains from airborne dust or soil from Africa. 3. Strains isolated from sea fans and seawater will not comprise genetically distinct populations. We have focused exclusively on Aspergillus flavus, for two reasons: 1) A. sydowii was never isolated from diseased sea fans, and 2) recently published papers on the population biology of A. sydowii suggest there is no population structure. On the other hand, recently published papers on A. flavus have opened new avenues for study because they have demonstrated for the first time the presence of mating types in this