Researchers in the Amazon have discovered new genetic mechanisms in fish parasites that could lead to vaccines, potentially safeguarding fish farming and biodiversity.
Researchers in the Amazon are investigating a mysterious parasite that is causing widespread devastation in fish farms across the globe.
The culprit, a group of microscopic parasites known as myxozoa, infects fish with lethal diseases. These parasites pose a serious threat to species such as salmon and trout, leading to global industry losses exceeding £50 ($66) million annually.
In the Amazon Basin, a region renowned for its rich fish biodiversity, an international team of scientists, led by King’s College London and the Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP), has found that over half of the fish they examined were infected. This high infection rate endangers local fish farming operations, threatens biodiversity, and impacts recreational fishing.
The problem isn’t limited to South America. In parts of the western United States, some streams have seen trout populations decline by as much as 90% due to similar parasitic outbreaks.
A Floating Lab in the Amazon
To find out more about these parasites, the team from King’s, UNIFESP, Federal University of Western Pará Brazil, University of Zagreb Croatia, University of Cambridge and Natural History Museum London set up a lab on a boat travelling along the Amazon Basin in Brazil where the Tapajós and Amazon Rivers converge, close to the city of Santarém, State of Pará.
They hope that investigating the different ways the parasites control their genes could hold the key to understanding the parasite and devising treatments.
Professor Paul Long, expert in marine biotechnology, Faculty of Life Sciences & Medicine, King’s College London, said: “We work in the Amazon because the diversity of life in the Amazon basin is undisputed and still little-known. This is especially true when it comes to parasites, which are hidden inside their hosts.
“Knowledge of parasites is fundamentally important for understanding the tree of life. How parasites co-evolve with their hosts and these complex relationships will influence biodiversity as well as ecosystem structure and function.
“To our surprise, we uncovered a new process of gene regulation that was previously believed not to exist in these parasites. Fish farming is a key contributor to global food security. Understanding how genes are turned on and off opens the opportunity to develop gene-based vaccines to control these economically significant fish pathogens.
Climate Change and Future Implications
Professor Edson Adriano, a parasitology expert from the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology-UNIFESP, said: “The vast Amazon Basin is home to the largest diversity of freshwater fish in the world. This makes it a perfect setting to study fish parasites.
“Our discoveries about epigenetic processes in myxozoans open new avenues for understanding how the distinct conditions encountered by the parasite throughout its life cycle can affect genetic regulation. This becomes even more important when considering the impact scenarios predicted by climate change.”
Dr Santiago Benites de Pádua, a veterinarian and manager of Brazilian Fish Company, added: “Studies on these parasites are essential for developing strategies to control or reduce their impact on the health of farmed fish.”
Reference: “Long-read metagenomic sequencing negates inferred loss of cytosine methylation in Myxosporea (Cnidaria: Myxozoa)” by Antonio Starcevic, Rayline T A Figueredo, Juliana Naldoni, Lincoln L Corrêa, Beth Okamura, Edson A Adriano and Paul F Long, 13 March 2025, GigaScience.
DOI: 10.1093/gigascience/giaf014
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