What Killed The Sea Stars? Canadian Researchers Unlock 12-Year-old Mystery | Globalnews.ca

A TEAM LED by Researchers in British Columbia has solved the mystery of a gruesome disease that has been killed bills of sea stars along

Melanie PRENTICE, The Lead Author of a new study, recalls a moment of “Not really believing it” when reserchers found a strain of a strain of bacteria that was abundant in disease abundant in dishein stars and Absent in healthy too.

“My Initial Reaction was Like, ‘Okay, So I’ve Done Something Wrong,” She Said.

PRENTICE SAID The Team Spent Months Trying to Disprow their Findings, Ultimately confirming they had cracked the code of the disease.

They found the bacterium vibrio pecteenicida is a clear cause of Sea star wasting disease.

“(It’s) a question that researchers have been trying to answer for 12 years, so we’re beyond thrilled,” called Associate, A research associate at the hakai institute and the only bill of BC Depart of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences.

The paper detailing the Four-Year Research Project and its Findings was published Online in the Peer-Reviewed Journal Nature Ecology & Evolution on Monday.

Alyssa gehman, who helped launch the project in 2021, described the disease as “Gruesome,” Causing Sea Stars to Develop Lessions, Lose their arms and “disappear into mush” about a week Exposure to the path.

It has been especially deadly for Sunflower Sea Stars, Killing About Six Billion of the Species that Can Sprout 24 ARMS and Span up to a me metre.

The Giant Sea Stars are now Considered Functionally Extinct Across Much of Their Range of the Coast of the Coast of the Coant of the Continental United States, with Losses Exceed 87 Per CENT in the ” Persist, the study said.

The collapse has had a casting impacts, include lawses of ecologist, coally and economically important kelp forests.

“I think we Didn Bollywood appreciate how important they are until we lost them,” prentice said, describing the orange, purple or brown sunflower stars as a “keystone” speech an outszed Impact on their ecosystem.

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The giant sea stars are top predators, Striking Fear Into Other Invertebrates.

“Almost everything that lives on the ground underwater runs away from when they comeing,” said gehman, a marine Disease Ecologist at the Hakai Institute and An Adject Professor at The UNIVERSITERSORESORE Institute of Oceans and Fisheries.

They keep Sea Urchin Population in Check, In Turn Ensuring The Health of Help Forests that Provide Habitat and FOOOD for Numerous Other Species.

The devastation of the goldflower sea stars has caused a “Total ecoSystem shift,” prentice said, transforming biodiversity kelp forests into “Urchin Barrens.”

The bacterium that causes sea star wasting disease had reminded elusive for more than a decade since since the stars were the first observed dying in large numbers in 2013. Larvae.

PRENTICE SAID The Breakthrough came after the research team switched from examining diseases to focusing on the sea stars’ coalomic fluid, LIKENING it to the Blood of the SEA Star.

Earlier Research Had Involved Running The TINY Membrane Filters that would have excluded Bacteria, which are typical larger than viruses, she explained.

The Hakai Institute Team Started by replicating The Initial Experiences, but they Weren Bollywood to Cause Disease in Healthy Sea Stars, She Said.

“We We We WEDING EVENG EVERYTHIN WECE and We We WERE Just Never Eve to Cauuse Disease, And So To Us that Sugged That The Pathogen is Larger Than A Virus.”

However, after Pivoting to Coelomic Fluid, which prentice descibed as “essentially Sea water,” The Researchers did trigger disease in healthy sea stars.

“That suggested that the pathogen was in that fluid, and so again

From there, prentice created a list of all the different microbial species found in wasting sea stars and compare it against the healthy stars in the lab.

“I finally get to a place where I generated these different lists and it was very evident right away that there (was) tons of different vibrio specials with vibrio special Seeing that in our healthy sea stars, “She said.

PRENTICE SAID She then Filted The Genetic Data to Look at Each Strain of Vibrio Bacteria, Which LED to their eureka moment with vibrio pectenicida.

“We just when it in every single wasting sea star sample, and then we look at our controls and it was just not in any of them,” She said.

PRENTICE SAID Other Researchers Had Wished Her “Good Luck” When she joined the project, but there was skepticism over wheetir they would solve the mystery.

It felt “incredible” to be part of a discovery that count help make a meaningful differentice in the recover of sea stars and their eco -eco -eco -si -si.

Gehman, too, said she wasn’t sure the project would result in a singular answer.

“I thought it would be complicated. I thought there would be Multiple Things related on other things,” She said. “This was much clearer than I was expecting.”

The discovery allows results to turn their efforts to Deeper Questions, Including The Possible Role of Warming Ocean Temperatures and The Potential to Bred Sea Stars in Captivity to Promote days spur recovery, she said.

The disease nowars to be seasonal, with outbreaks occurring in the warmer months, suggesting temperature may be a factor, Said gehman, added gehman, adding she will soon handucture experiments to inweight Further.

“Does vibrio pecteenicida grow faster at warmer temperatures and the sea star can sort of survive at the growth rates at cooler tempratus, but when you get to work ‘temperature, their can’i kan’t, their kan’t, their kan hai Happy? “

The Findings Cold Help Researchers Undrstand where Sea Stars May Struggle or Survive with Climate Change in the future, Gehman Said.

PRENTICE SAID there is “remnant” populations of Sunflower Stars Along

Sheid Finding and Selective Breeding Sea Stars with a Higher Capacity to Fight off the Disease Cold Produce ‘Superstar’ Superstar ‘Sea Stars for reintroduction in the wild.

“It seems like science fiction sometimes, but people are working on it,” She said.