ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Microbiol.
Sec. Microorganisms in Vertebrate Digestive Systems
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2025.1564052
Characterization of bacteria colonizing the mucosal layer of the gastrointestinal tract of Atlantic salmon farmed in a warm water region
Provisionally accepted
- 1Tasmanian Institute of Agriculture, College of Sciences and Engineering, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
- 2University of Tasmania, Hobart, Australia
- 3CSIRO Livestock and Aquaculture, Battery Point, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
- 4CSIRO Agriculture and Food, Livestock & Aquaculture, Battery Point, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
- 5CSIRO Environments, Battery Point, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
- 6Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies, College of Sciences and Engineering, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
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Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) farmed in seawater in Tasmania (lutruwita) can experience temperatures close to their thermotolerance limit during summer. Gut microbiome data from eight successive annual surveys and a specific survey of GI tract mucosa and digesta bacterial crosssectional distributions indicated members of the genus Aliivibrio, Vibrio, and an unclassified Mycoplasmoidaceae are the main colonizers of the gut mucosal layer in Tasmanian farmed salmon.Peak abundance levels were reached after 7 to 8 months after transfer of smolt to sea cages from hatcheries. This corresponds to the late summer, with transfer of hatchery smolt occurring in winter.Salmon Aliivibrio isolates comprise three novel non-bioluminescent species. Along with other Aliivibrio species these species have genes in common required for host colonization and biofilm formation and also include species and strain-level dependent features. Two of the novel Aliivibrio species surprisingly possessed genes for cytolethal distending toxin while the more predominant species lacked any known virulence genes. The overall observations suggest a restricted group of species actively colonize the mucosal layer of Atlantic salmon farmed in Tasmania and that this process is strongly influenced by the environmental temperature.
Keywords: Atlantic salmon, temperature, Aliivibrio, Vibrio, Photobacterium, colonization
Received: 22 Jan 2025; Accepted: 24 Jun 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Reid, Taylor, Bissett, Nowak and Bowman. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: John Phillip Bowman, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Australia
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