Adam Reitzel
University of North Carolina at Charlotte, NC·Ecology & Evolution
Every animal must decide which microbes to welcome and which to fight. Animal immune systems handle helpful partners, harmful pathogens and viruses, and both sides evolve in response to each other.
- Fields
Ecology & Evolution
Genetics
Microbiology & Immunology
- Topics
Nematostella vectensis
starlet sea anemone
cnidarian
- Grants
- 2 known grants, through Jul 2029
What they work on
- Measure the extent of copy number variation in key immune genes across Nematostella vectensis populations using comparative genomics and transcriptomics.
- Test how immune gene copy number affects anemone survival, physiology and microbial community, using metagenomics and experimental infections.
- Use transgenesis in Nematostella to test how immune gene duplications shape host-microbe interactions and the specialization of innate immunity.
- Detect signs of positive selection in the antiviral pathway by comparing viromes and transcriptomes of Nematostella populations across its native and introduced North American range.
- Test whether anemone populations are locally adapted to their own viral communities, and how single antiviral components respond to viruses, using mesocosm, laboratory and transgenic experiments.
More about the research
Much of what is known comes from vertebrates. Far less is known about how marine invertebrates' innate (inborn) immune systems vary and adapt in the wild. The lab studies these questions in the starlet sea anemone Nematostella vectensis. This small coastal cnidarian, a relative of corals and jellyfish, is a model for ecological and evolutionary genomics. The team has used it to study genetic diversity, local adaptation and microbiome variation, and it has tools for making transgenic (genetically modified) animals.
Why it matters
Understanding how immune gene variation shapes microbiomes and disease resistance could guide efforts to conserve marine invertebrates important to aquaculture and ecosystem resilience. It could also clarify how coastal species exposed to different viruses may cope in habitats vulnerable to climate change.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Marjorie Matocq
University of Nevada-Reno, NV·Ecology & Evolution
Identify individual copy number variation (CNV), differences in how many copies each animal carries, in detoxification genes across a woodrat hybrid zone between Neotoma fuscipes and N. macrotis, using genome sequencing.
Kent Hatch
New College of Florida, FL·Ecology & Evolution
Test the relative importance of environmental filtering, host selection, spatial connectivity, microbial competition, cospeciation and host switching in shaping marine invertebrate microbiomes, using models from evolutionary and metacommunity ecology.
Alison Gould
Temple University, PA·Microbiology & Immunology·Early-career
Test whether co-occurring Siphamia fish species associate with distinct strains of the glowing bacterium Photobacterium mandapamensis, using comparative genomics of bacterial strains isolated from each host.
The school
University of North Carolina at Charlotte: 9 labs on PI Pages, $95M a year on research, 196 research doctorates a year.
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