 BioMarKs; Biodiversity of Marine Eukaryotes
Coordinator: Dr. Colomban De Vargas
Participating countries: FR, UK, ES, NO
Link to presentation
BioMarKs integrates 8 EU research institutes and 30 EU experts in eukaryotic microbial taxonomy and evolution, marine biology and ecology, genomics and molecular biology, bioinformatics, as well as marine economy and policy, to assess the taxonomic depth, environmental significance, human health and economical implications of the least explored biodiversity compartment in the biosphere: the unicellular eukaryotes or protists. Marine protists are microbial organisms which may build complex (in)organic skeletal structures. They profoundly impact biogeochemical cycles and climate; they have complex genomes with thousands of genes producing molecules which influence marine ecosystem functioning, human health and economy, and which represent outstanding potential for future green energies, pharmaceutics and chemical industries.
BioMarKs will assess protist biodiversity at 3 depths (subsurface, deep-chlorophyll maximum, surface sediment) in 9 EU coastal water sites from Spitzbergen to the Black Sea using massive rDNA sequencing (454 sequencing technologies). We will use both rDNA and reverse transcribed rRNA general eukaryote and group-specific markers, in order to analyze both diversity and abundance/activity of marine protists at different taxonomic levels. A suite of physical, chemical, and biological metadata from the same samples will allow statistical analyses of the ecological forces shaping marine protist biodiversity.
This general strategy will be used to (i) establish a baseline of protist biodiversity in EU coastal waters, (ii) measure biodiversity change in marine protist communities facing ocean acidification, (iii) evaluate the impact of ballast water and pollution on marine protist biodiversity.
In addition BioMarKs will provide baseline data and new methods for future surveys of marine biodiversity change and for evaluation of its ecological and economic cost. The data retrieved in the frames of BioMarKs will become the largest world community resource on marine unicellular eukaryotic biodiversity, providing a reference platform for current and future projects dealing with this important biodiversity compartment, and elevating the European community to the forefront of marine eukaryote microbial ecology.
BioMarKs will actively promote the diffusion of its data and new methods to a wide range of stakeholders and for scientific and public education. Several international research programs on marine biodiversity, major genetic databases and protist culture collections, governmental and private agencies involved in legislation and monitoring of coastal marine waters, foundations and companies with interest in marine biotechnologies, as well as key scientific personalities in the fields of marine science and biodiversity have already expressed their interest in BioMarKs. The full list of BioMarks stakeholders with expressions of interest is available onto the project website .
All BioMarKs stakeholders receive regular information on project progress via tri-annual enewsletters, which will also be widely distributed on relevant e-mail lists and web sites. Provision of e-newsletters will provide the opportunity to seek regular feed-back from all stakeholders; comments, suggestions and collaborative opportunities will be integrated into project functioning at the level of the PIC on a regular basis. Finally, we will make a concerted effort to foster longer-term consolidation of the BioMarKs approach by making a series of presentations to private stakeholders in order to involve them both financially and in terms of scientific collaborations. In order to better characterize the taxonomic, ecological, and/or economical value of their own data and analyses, stakeholders will be provided with open access to the BioMarKs datasets within 3 months of their completion via the BioMarks web portal. Full public open access to datasets will be provided via the same source and via GenBank within 12 months of completion.
A workshop will be co-organized with the help of an external collaborator Dr. Harold Levrel from the Marine Economics Department at IFREMER (Brest, France). After a 1-day synthesis of significant BioMarKs results, 2 days of the workshop will be dedicated to discussion on the ecosystemic services provided by eukaryotes biodiversity and populations. This process should permit to develop a first list of ecosystem services, regarding the results of the research program at this stage. For this, we will use the Millenium Ecosystem Assessment framework, and in particular its classification of ecosystem services (supporting, provisioning, regulating and cultural). Key stakeholders including environmental agencies will be invited to this meeting, and a workshop report will be distributed to all stakeholders and other interested parties at month 30. The new methods, tools, and statistics for monitoring future eukaryotic microbial diversity change and for evaluating its economic implications will be made available though the BioMarKs website.
In terms of policy, the BioMarKs database and associated tools will be direct relevance in several EU legislative framework, including:
Marine transport regulation: The discharge of ballast water is a major pathway for the transfer of alien aquatic species and potentially harmful organisms and pathogens around the world.
Coastal management and tourism: Coastal zones are typically areas of intense human activity and are important in diverse economic and societal contexts. Most of this activity impacts the coastal environment, notably in terms of water quality.
Sea food safety: Various toxins produced by marine protists can accumulate in larger organisms such as fish and molluscs and can ultimately affect both marine metazoan and human consumers.
BioMarKs will provide new molecular methods and database tools which will be particularly useful for the management of these three issues.
BioMarks will allow estimation of the global ocean eukaryotic genomic diversity, and will lay the foundation for taxonomically controlled eukaryotic metagenomics. The database created during the project will become a reference for scientists and end-users for years. In addition, the immense and unexplored repertoire of protist genes will be potentially an outstanding source of innovation for green energies, pharmaceutics, cosmetics, and nanotechnology for the next years.
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