title: Microhabitats within venomous cone snails contain diverse actinobacteria.
abstract: Actinomycetes can be symbionts in diverse organisms, including both plants and animals. Some actinomycetes benefit their host by producing small molecule secondary metabolites; the resulting symbioses are often developmentally complex. Actinomycetes associated with three cone snails were studied. Cone snails are venomous tropical marine gastropods which have been extensively examined because of their production of peptide-based neurological toxins, but no microbiological studies have been reported on these organisms. A microhabitat approach was used in which dissected tissue from each snail was treated as an individual sample in order to explore bacteria in the tissues separately. Our results revealed a diverse, novel, and highly culturable cone snail-associated actinomycete community, with some isolates showing promising bioactivity in a neurological assay. This suggests that cone snails may represent an underexplored reservoir of novel actinomycetes of potential interest for drug discovery.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicinal Chemistry, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah 84112, USA.
authors.forename: Olivier
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Peraud
authors.forename: Jason S
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Biggs
authors.forename: Ronald W
authors.initials: RW
authors.lastname: Hughen
authors.forename: Alan R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Light
authors.forename: Gisela P
authors.initials: GP
authors.lastname: Concepcion
authors.forename: Baldomero M
authors.initials: BM
authors.lastname: Olivera
authors.forename: Eric W
authors.initials: EW
authors.lastname: Schmidt
mesh_terms: D039903:Actinobacteria / Q000145:classification* / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D000818:Animals; D044822:Biodiversity; D016000:Cluster Analysis; D004269:DNA, Bacterial / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics; D004275:DNA, Ribosomal / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics; D017753:Ecosystem; D005727:Ganglia, Spinal / Q000502:physiology; D010802:Phylogeny; D012336:RNA, Ribosomal, 16S / Q000235:genetics; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA; D012908:Snails / Q000382:microbiology*
chemical_list: D004269:DNA, Bacterial; D004275:DNA, Ribosomal; D012336:RNA, Ribosomal, 16S