RESEARCH ARTICLE
First Molecular Identification of Symbiotic Archaea in a Sponge Collected from the Persian Gulf, Iran
Akram Najafi1, Maryam Moradinasab2, Mohammad Seyedabadi3, Mohammad A. Haghighi4, Iraj Nabipour1, *
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2018Volume: 12
First Page: 323
Last Page: 332
Publisher ID: TOMICROJ-12-323
DOI: 10.2174/1874285801812010323
Article History:
Received Date: 17/7/2018Revision Received Date: 21/9/2018
Acceptance Date: 23/9/2018
Electronic publication date: 17/10/2018
Collection year: 2018
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode). This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Background:
Marine sponges are associated with numerically vast and phylogenetically diverse microbial communities at different geographical locations. However, little is known about the archaeal diversity of sponges in the Persian Gulf. The present study was aimed to identify the symbiotic archaea with a sponge species gathered from the Persian Gulf, Iran.
Methods:
Sponge sample was collected from a depth of 3 m offshore Bushehr, Persian Gulf, Iran. Metagenomic DNA was extracted using a hexadecyl trimethyl ammonium bromide (CTAB) method. The COI mtDNA marker was used for molecular taxonomy identification of sponge sample. Also, symbiotic archaea were identified using the culture-independent analysis of the 16S rRNA gene and PCR- cloning.
Results:
In this study, analysis of multilocus DNA marker and morphological characteristics revealed that the sponge species belonged to Chondrilla australiensis isolate PG_BU4. PCR cloning and sequencing showed that all of the sequences of archaeal 16S rRNA gene libraries clustered into the uncultured archaeal group.
Conclusion:
The present study is the first report of the presence of the genus of Chondrilla in the Persian Gulf. Traditional taxonomy methods, when used along with molecular techniques, could play a significant role in the accurate taxonomy of sponges. Also, the uncultured archaea may promise a potential source for bioactive compounds. Further functional studies are needed to explore the role of the sponge-associated uncultured archaea as a part of the marine symbiosis.
