www.aquaculture.ugent.be
The Ghent University Aquaculture R&D Consortium brings together 17 research groups from 3 different faculties focusing on various aspects related to aquaculture. Research activities include zootechnology (larviculture), morphology, immunology, genetics, pathology, microbiology (protistology, bacteriology and virology), biochemistry, ecology, marine biology, (human) nutrition, (organic) chemistry and synthesis, and economy. The consortium is managed by the Laboratory of Aquaculture & Artemia Reference Center.
The Laboratory of Aquaculture & Artemia Reference Center has long years of experience with respect to aquatic host-microbe interactions: disease prevention and control, immunology, immunostimulation and priming, virulence gene regulation (including quorum sensing), antivirulence therapy and microbial ecology. Several model systems that allow studying the behaviour of vibrios during infection of a host are operational at the laboratory, including brine shrimp (Artemia franciscana) larvae challenged with V. anguillarum, V. campbellii, V. harveyi or V. parahaemolyticus, sea bass (Dicentrarchus labrax) larvae challenged with V. anguillarum, and blue mussel (Mytilus edulis) larvae challenged with V. anguillarum, V. campbellii or V. splendidus. These organisms can be reared under conventional as well as under (semi-)gnotobiotic conditions.
Selected recent publications:
- Ruwandeepika HAD, Jayaweera TSP, Bhowmick PP, Karunasagar I, Bossier P and Defoirdt T (2012). Pathogenesis, virulence factors and virulence regulation of vibrios belonging to the Harveyi clade. Reviews in Aquaculture, 4: 59-74.
- Defoirdt T and Sorgeloos P (2012). Monitoring of Vibrio harveyi quorum sensing activity in real time during infection of brine shrimp larvae. ISME Journal, 6: 2314-2319.
- Pande GSJ, Natrah FMI, Sorgeloos P, Bossier P and Defoirdt T (2013). The Vibrio harveyi quorum sensing signals have a different impact on virulence of the bacterium towards different crustacean hosts. Veterinary Microbiology, 167: 540-545.
- Norouzitallab P, Baruah K, Vandegehuchte M, Van Stappen G, Catania F, Vanden Bussche J, Vanhaecke L, Sorgeloos P and Bossier P (2014). Environmental heat stress induces epigenetic transgenerational inheritance of robustness in parthenogenetic Artemia model. FASEB Journal, 28: 3552-3563.
- Yang Q and Defoirdt T (2014). Quorum sensing positively regulates flagellar motility in pathogenic Vibrio harveyi. Environmental Microbiology, 2015 Apr; 17(4): 960-8. doi:10.1111/1462-2920.12420