Archive for the News Category

The invited review for the Encyclopedia of Life provides an overview and comparison of the two chytrid pathogens of amphibians and provides insight into disease management. Contributors include 5 students in the Woodhams lab.

Woodhams, D.C., Barnhart, K.L., Bletz, M.C., Campos, A.J., Ganem, S.J., Hertz, A., LaBumbard, B.C., Nanjappa, P. and Tokash‐Peters, A.G. (2020). Batrachochytrium: Biology and Management of Amphibian Chytridiomycosis. In eLS, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd (Ed.). doi:10.1002/9780470015902.a0027207

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We believe that everyone has a Plant Love Story: a story about how plants have shaped your life. We’re collecting these stories to show how plants affect us all. Please share your story!

https://www.plantlovestories.com/blank-2/2018/04/04/The-viper-leaves

Read about the study in the New York Times featured by Carl Zimmer, A Few Species of Frogs That Vanished May Be on the Rebound.

Also on ScienceNews: Some frogs may be bouncing back after killer chytrid fungus (featured by Susan Milius), UMass Boston News, and Commentary in Science by Prof. Jim Collins, Arizona State University, “Change is Key to Frog Survival”.

Kelly Barnhart successfully defends her Master’s thesis- “From Symbionts to Pathogens: Interactions Within the Amphibian Skin Mucosome”.

Dr. Hertz and Woodhams captured Panama leopard frogs, Rana pipiens species E, near Santa Fe, Panama.  The undescribed species is similar to  Northern leopard frogs but may produce unique skin peptide secretions with medicinal properties.

In this new article published in Frontiers in Microbiology, the Woodhams Lab in collaboration with the New England Aquarium suggests that host associated fungi may work better than bacteria for amphibian skin probiotics against chytridiomycosis.

Patrick J. Kearns, Sarah Fischer, Saioa Fernández-Beaskoetxea, Caitlin R. Gabor, Jaime Bosch, Jennifer L. Bowen, Michael F. Tlusty, and Douglas C. Woodhams. Fight Fungi with Fungi: Antifungal Properties of the Amphibian Mycobiome. (2017) Frontiers in Microbiology.

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In a new study, Woodhams and colleagues show that compounds such as prodigiosin and violacein produced by amphibian skin bacteria can inhibit fungal pathogens. Volatile organic compounds were also inhibitory.  The team showed that these bacteria are widespread and potentially useful probiotics.

Woodhams DC, LaBumbard BC, Barnhart KL, Becker MH, Bletz MC, Escobar LA, Flechas SV, Forman ME, Iannetta AA, Joyce MD, Rabemananjara F, Gratwicke B, Vences M, Minbiole KPC. (2017) Prodigiosin, violacein, and volatile organic compounds produced by widespread cutaneous bacteria of amphibians can inhibit two Batrachochytrium fungal pathogens. Microbial Ecology, https://doi.org/10.1007/s00248-017-1095-7

Dr. Woodhams contributes to the Earth Microbiome Consortium of over 500 scientists, and a new paper in Nature led by Luke Thompson, “A communal catalogue reveals Earth’s multiscale microbial diversity.” This will become a key database, and a framework to place future microbiome studies in a global context.

Popular press stories can be found here: http://www.earthmicrobiome.org/news/, or download the paper: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature24621

A study led by Molly Bletz estimates herd immunity against amphibian chytridiomycosis in Madagascar.

Bletz MC, Myers J, Woodhams DC, Rabemananjara FCE, Rakotonirina A, Weldon C, Edmonds D, Vences M, Harris RN. (2017) Estimating herd immunity to amphibian chytridiomycosis in Madagascar based on the defensive function of amphibian skin bacteria. Frontiers in Microbiology.

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2017.01751/full