Difference between revisions of "Team:Georgia State/Description"

The Problem

Our team was inspired by the Netflix documentary, Chasing Coral. Coral bleaching, the loss of algal symbionts necessary for the survival of cnidarian reef organisms, is a disastrous environmental issue with global consequences. No single factor has been established as the cause of this catastrophe, but there are a multitude of suspects including increased greenhouse gas emissions and rising seawater temperatures.

The Plan

To identify optimal algal growth conditions, we tested various factors such as growth media, light intensity, and temperature. We designed a codon optimized red fluorescent protein part that was cloned into a dinoflagellate-optimized expression plasmid (DinoIII)(Sprecher, et. al 2019) for transformation into our model organism as a proof of concept. In parallel, we are also attempting to replicate the only known successful transformation of Symbiodinium using an Agrobacterium tumefacien co-culture carrying a binary vector, pCB302-GFP-MBD (Ortiz-Matamoros et. al 2015), and designing/executing various electroporation protocols. A genomic analysis of clade D Symbiodinium, a clade associated with higher resistance to bleaching but diminished coral growth, will identify target genes related to bleaching resistance for transformation into the growth-favorable clade C of Symbiodinium. The corals will then uptake the modified host algae, increasing their resistance to bleaching.

Sprecher,B., Zhang,H. & Lin, S. (2019, April 9). Nuclear gene transformation in a dinoflagellate. doi: 10.1101/602821

Ortiz-Matamoros, M.F., Islas-Flores, T., Voigt, B., Menzel, D., Baluška, F. & Villanueva, M.A. (2015, July 13). Heterologous DNA Uptake in Cultured Symbiodinium spp. Aided by Agrobacterium tumefaciens. doi:10.1371/journal. Pone.0132693