Coronula diadema and Xenobalanus globicipitis genomics and the identification of genes related to the ecological association between barnacles and cetaceans

• Grant number: 22/14490-9
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Post-Doctoral
• Start date: January 01, 2023
• Status: Discontinued
• Field of knowledge: Biological Sciences - Genetics - Animal Genetics
• Principal Investigator: Sónia Cristina da Silva Andrade
• Grantee: Rafael Eiji Iwama
• Host Institution: Instituto de Biociências (IB). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated research grant: 21/06738-8 - Seascape genetics and comparative genomics: an integrative evolutionary approach in marine invertebrates, AP.BTA.JP2
• Associated scholarship(s): 25/01088-6 - Characterization of the innate immune response against viruses in the bay barnacle Balanus improvisus (Thecostraca: Thoracica) with emphasis on Vago, BE.EP.PD

Abstract

Epibiosis is the ecological relationship where an organism is used as a substrate for another without feeding on it. Several species of barnacles are epibionts or obligatory parasites of marine organisms, such as cetaceans, especially the barnacles of the Coronulidae family. In this family, the species Coronula diadema and Xenobalanus globicipitis can be interesting models in the study of gene regions related to adaptations to epibiosis/ectoparasitism, and specificity in the choice of habitat. The comparison between genomes of epibiotic species with those of species that attach to fixed and inorganic substrates is very informative, enabling the identification of regions related to adaptation to life dependent on a living substrate, such as fixation to the substrate, stress and tolerance to changes in habitat. Works of this nature are very rare in the literature, making this one pioneer. In the present study our main goals are (i) sequence and annotate C. diadema and X. globicipitis barnacle genomes seeking for genes that may be involved with the ecological relationship of epibiosis/ectoparasitism between barnacles and whales and dolphins. A comparative genomic analysis will be carried out between the genomes assembled here and the genomes and transcriptomes of barnacle species which live in fixed substrates available in online databases (SRA-NCBI); (ii) identify genes that are under positive selection in C. diadema and X. globicipitis and presenting a protein product related to adaptation to living in mobile substrates (epibiosis/ectoparasitism) and (iii) sequence the mitochondrial genomes of the barnacles C. diadema and X. globicipitis and compare them with those of other species of non-epibiont barnacles fixed on immobile substrates, in order to identify possible differences in mitochondrial DNA, such as different rates of metabolism and alterations in the number and disposition of genes. (AU)