JAPAN – Hiroshima University scientists have identified a new species of parasite infecting an invasive freshwater fish on the subtropical island of Okinawa, Japan.
The results are part of a project to find parasites that have arrived in Japan with their non-native hosts and understand the role of parasites in natural ecosystems. Tracking parasites can be one scientific method to monitor ecosystem health and attempt to conserve biodiversity.
The project began in 2012 when one of the researchers was trying to fill some of his free time.
Masato Nitta, now a second-year PhD student at Hiroshima University, recognized some invasive fish in the stream that runs through the campus of the University of the Ryukyus in Okinawa, Japan, the university that hosted his research team during their field studies.
“It was just for play, not for official study. I saw two of the invasive catfish and I decided to try to catch them and check what parasites they had because I was curious. When I put the parasites under the microscope, they looked a little bit strange. No one had seen these parasites in Japan before,” said Nitta.
Farms in the European Union each year about 109,000 tons of gold, representing a turnover of more than 500 million euros annually. One of the main threats to the sector are viral infections, including one of the most widespread is the lymphocystis.
This disease is characterized by the formation of tumors on the skin as a result of an increase up to 100 times the volume of the affected cells, and hitherto thought that was caused only by infection iridovirus.
Spanish researchers have used DNA techniques to study ultrasecuenciación community lymphocystis associated virus, which affects at least 150 different species of fish. Through these techniques, scientists were able to assemble the complete genome of a new species of Iridoviruses, which turned out to be very different from two other genomes so far sequenced same genre.
Red mark syndrome (RMS) and US strawberry disease (US SD) are skin disorders affecting rainbow trout farmed in Europe and USA. The disease etiology has not yet been established. In spite of specific investigations, identifying Rickettsia-like organism (RLO)- and Midichloria-like organism (MLO)-related DNA in affected individuals, these pathogens have never been observed. We performed histological, ultrastructural and biomolecular analysis on skin and spleen samples of trout with RMS. Examination by TEM revealed the presence of intracytoplasmic microorganisms resembling Rickettsiales within macrophages, fibroblasts and erythrocytes. The microorganisms were oval or short rod shaped (400–800 nm in length and 100–200 nm in width) and often showed a cell wall similar to Gram-negative bacteria. PCR analysis for Rickettsiales supported these findings: 53% of affected trout were positive by both PCR and TEM The primers RiFCfw-RiFCrev were used to anneal both the RLO 16S DNA sequence and the MLO 16S DNA sequence. For this reason, and in agreement with previous studies confirming the presence of Rickettsiales-related DNA i
CSIRO scientist Dr Ken McColl has been recognised for the value and impact of his carp biocontrol research.
Dr McColl was named the winner of the 2016 Professor Dave Choquenot Science Award for Excellence in Pest Animal Research.
Invasive Animals Cooperative Research Centre chief executive officer Andreas Glanznig said that this award was extremely deserved by Dr McColl, who was instrumental in discovering that Cyprinid herpesvirus-3 could be effective as a management option for European carp. The research outcomes were fundamental in the formation of the Australian Government funded National Carp Control Plan.
“Based on Dr McColl’s rigorous scientific observations over the past eight years, we are confident that the carp herpesvirus only kills carp and does not infect, and therefore cannot affect, a wide range of non-target animals in Australia,” Mr Glanznig said.
“Dr McColl’s findings have resulted in the publication of eight peer-reviewed scientific articles and one book chapter, making Dr McColl one of the global leaders and experts on this research topic.”
South Australia’s world-leading $3.8 million fruit fly facility opened last week providing a powerful new line of defence against one of horticulture’s most damaging pests.
Agriculture Minister Leon Bignell opened the National Sterile Insect Technology (SIT) Centre in Port Augusta last week.
The Centre will produce 50 million sterile male Queensland fruit flies each week. The flies will be released to mate with females, collapsing wild populations in fruit fly affected horticulture growing regions.
Fruit flies are the world’s worst horticultural pest, destroying fruit and vegetables in commercial crops, home gardens and impacting trade access. The Queensland fruit fly, or Q-fly, is a major pest which attacks fruit and vegetable crops in Australia.
South Australia is the only mainland State to be declared fruit fly free with the State Government committing around $5 million each year to fight the threat of fruit fly.
At 10:22 on November 15, 2016 Source: Zhejiang Online – Ningbo Channel reporter Weng Yun Qian correspondent Wang Huyu
Farmed pomfret bream
Zhejiang Online News (Reporter Weng Yun Qian correspondent Wang Huyu) Ningbo tube called silver pomfret pomfret flat fish. This round flat shape of fish because of its taste delicious, nutrient-rich, has always been a frequent visitor to the coastal people on the table. However, entering the 1990s, due to overfishing, combined with the deterioration of the marine environment every year, the amount of silver pomfret marked decline. Some even predicted that after several years without pomfret can catch!
Less and less wild, how artificial breeding situation?
Yesterday afternoon, the reporter, “the East China Sea pomfret pre-industrial technology research and demonstration” project acceptance site get good news from Ningbo University –
Ferran Garcia-Marí, researcher at the Agroforestry Institute of the Mediterranean (UPV), believes that control measures need to be enforced to prevent a hypothetical propagation in Spain of Huanglongbing (HLB), or greening disease, the world’s most dangerous disease for citrus fruits. “The insect vector has already been detected in Galicia, and if the bacterium reaches Spain, the HLB could put an end to the country’s citrus crops, as is already happening in Florida,” assures Garcia-Marí.
Citrus producers in Florida have been suffering a severe crisis since the identification, in 2005, of the first case of HLB, a disease that has already killed millions of trees and which has forced growers to redirect a considerable share of their fruit to the production of juices, given their inability to market the oranges, lemons and grapefruits; and all of this just seven years after the vector was first detected.
DEKALB, Ill. — A new bacterial corn disease was found in several Midwestern states including Iowa and Illinois this fall. Last year, two new corn diseases appeared in Illinois, making it the first time in four decades for new diseases to be spotted here.
There is still much work to be done to understand the new diseases, to see if they pose a threat to yields and to determine how to best control them economically and effectively.
It’s too early to know if this is a trend, but Illinois, Iowa and Nebraska researches say part of the reason more bacterial corn diseases are being recognized here is because there is better detection technology and people are watching closely.
“Part of it is that we look at crops more closely now. Agronomists and field specialists also look later in the year,” said Russ Higgins, University of Illinois Extension educator based in Shabbona, Ill.
Finding more corn diseases means, in part, “we are doing a good job looking for them,” he said.
Still there isn’t an easy explanation why more diseases are being found.
The disease, which occurs on short-cut Bermuda and Zoysia grasses, had golf course superintendents from Texas to Florida “scared,” Dr. Young-Ki Jo said, because it ruined the aesthetic looks of their fairways and greens, which could have some players teed-off.
Jo and his counterpart Dr. Maria Tomaso-Peterson at Mississippi State University independently were examining samples of the infected grasses from various courses and, when they compared notes, agreed that the responsible pathogen was not known to scientists.
Ultimately, through lab tests and DNA sequence comparisons, the researchers found the pathogen was a new species of fungal disease, which they named Curvularia malina. Their finding was published in a recent edition of the journal Mycologia.
“Fungi is a common culprit of turf disease. So we isolated and cultured them for identification,” Jo said.
They also poured over reports of similar fungal diseases and found similarities on various courses in Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Florida and even in Japan and China, yet it remained unnamed and with few details about its life cycle.
Toluca, State of Mexico, 29 October.- Although there is no completely effective treatment or vaccine for the disease infectious pancreatic necrosis (IPN) in fish, prevention measures and control are of great importance for large producers, said the specialist Center for Research and Advanced Studies in Animal Health, College of Veterinary Medicine at the Autonomous University of the State of Mexico, Celene Miranda Salgado.
He said the introduction of eggs and fish, as well as water supply free of the virus, constitute the main strategy in preventing the disease, as they are the main risk factors in the spread of this disease.
The author of the research paper “Infectious pancreatic necrosis: emerging disease in trout farms of Mexico” stressed that the virus mainly affects salmonids and rainbow trout is the species most susceptible to the condition.