Assessment of Symbiont Community in Acropora tersa Broodstock Using ITS2 Sequencing [RRAP Year 2; ECT2.1]
Mass coral bleaching and mortality events have increased in frequency over the last 30 years. Genetic interventions like assisted gene flow may speed up adaptation in reefs with less heat-tolerant corals by increasing the frequency of heat tolerance-associated genetic variants; however, the ideal approach to broodstock selection for this intervention remain unclear. To investigate, we collected Acropora tersa (formerly A. hyacinthus "neat") broodstock colonies from reefs along a thermal gradient on the Great Barrier Reef in November 2021. Fragments were taken from each broodstock colony and preserved in ethanol followed by DNA extraction, internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) amplification (using fITS7/ITS4 primers), and amplicon sequencing on an Illumina MiSeq (2x 250bp) at The Ramaciotti Centre for Genomics (University of New South Wales, Sydney Australia). The aim was to further our understanding about how the symbiont communities might different within and among broodstock colonies with varying thermal history provenance as this could inform how selective breeding is approached. This data was collected as part of the Reef Restoration and Adaptation Program (RRAP) within subprogram Enhanced Corals and Treatments 2.1. [Additional metadata available at: https://doi.org/10.25845/8hak-yt67]
Mass coral bleaching and mortality events have increased in frequency over the last 30 years. Genetic interventions like assisted gene flow may speed up adaptation in reefs with less heat-tolerant corals by increasing the frequency of heat tolerance-associated genetic variants; however, the ideal approach to broodstock selection for this intervention remain unclear. To investigate, we collected Acropora tersa (formerly A. hyacinthus "neat") broodstock colonies from reefs along a thermal gradient on the Great Barrier Reef in November 2021. Fragments were taken from each broodstock colony and preserved in ethanol followed by DNA extraction, internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) amplification (using fITS7/ITS4 primers), and amplicon sequencing on an Illumina MiSeq (2x 250bp) at The Ramaciotti Centre for Genomics (University of New South Wales, Sydney Australia). The aim was to further our understanding about how the symbiont communities might different within and among broodstock colonies with varying thermal history provenance as this could inform how selective breeding is approached. This data was collected as part of the Reef Restoration and Adaptation Program (RRAP) within subprogram Enhanced Corals and Treatments 2.1. [Additional metadata available at: https://doi.org/10.25845/8hak-yt67]
Australian Institute of Marine Science