#chytridiomycosis

[18thcenturythirsttrap]

He invented mini saunas for frogs – now this biologist has big plans to save hundreds of species

A deadly fungus has already wiped out 90 species and threatens 500 more but Anthony Waddle is hoping gene replacement could be their salvati

This is a very interesting article which highlights not only the existential threat that chytrid fungus poses to amphibians (it has wiped out 90 species already), but also the ethical dilemma around synthetic biology, in which organisms have genetic material introduced or deleted, for example in the hope of increasing disease resistance.

Also, I would be remiss if I did not say that there is an incredibly cute picture of two frogs sharing one of the 'mini-saunas', an intervention which has already helped Australian green and golden bell frogs face off the chytrid fungus threat.

[rjzimmerman]

'Like a Mini Med Spa for Frogs': Biologists Develop Shelters to Help Vulnerable and Endangered Amphibians Fight Disease - EcoWatch

Biologists have created small hotspot shelters to help vulnerable and endangered frogs and other amphibians fight off a deadly fungal diseas

Excerpt from this story from EcoWatch:

Biologists have created small hotspot shelters that operate like little saunas to help vulnerable and endangered amphibians fight off a fast-spreading and deadly fungal disease that has been a major threat to amphibians for decades.

Researchers from Macquarie University and the University of Melbourne developed the shelters as a way to help amphibians ward off chytridiomycosis, a fungal disease of the skin. 

As explained by Amphibian Ark, a conservation group, the fungi that cause the disease can grow in the skin of an infected amphibian. The fungi inhibit the ability for water to move through the amphibian’s skin, leading to heart failure. Outbreaks of chytridiomycosis have led to major declines in some amphibian species around the world, particularly in Australia, Mexico, Central America, the Andes region of South America and the western U.S., Amphibian Ark reported.

Globally, 90% of amphibians that are threatened by chytridiomycosis have become extinct in the wild or altogether, and 124 affected species have seen population declines of 90% or higher, Macquarie University reported.

In response, researchers found a low-cost way that they determined to be effective in improving the frogs’ resiliency to the disease. They used whatever materials were already available, such as bricks or PVC, to build small shelters for the amphibians. The idea is that the shelters will become warm enough that the fungal disease will not be able to grow or spread.

“The whole thing is like a mini med spa for frogs,” Anthony Waddle, lead author of the study and a Schmidt Science Fellow at Macquarie University’s Applied BioSciences, said in a statement. “In these simple little hotspots, frogs can go and heat up their bodies to a temperature that destroys the infections. As with many human diseases, such as influenza, chytridiomycosis is seasonal. Winter is a particularly vulnerable time for frogs, given there are few opportunities to heat themselves up. By making hot spots available to frogs in winter, we empower them to cure their infections, or not even get sick at all.”

[animalworld]

MORELET’S TREE FROG Agalychnis moreletii ©Laura Quick

Morelet’s tree frog is a species of tree frog of family Hylidae. It belongs to the leaf frog subfamily, and is found in Belize, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico. They have also been called black-eyed leaf frog and popeye hyla.

The population of Morelet’s tree frogs are also being affected due to a disease called Chytridiomycosis, which is an infectious disease that kills amphibians. Chytridiomycosis and habitat destruction are projected to cause the population to decline over 80% in the next 10 years. In some regions, the frogs have gone extinct completely. source

Other posts you might like:

Strawberry Poison Frog

Red-eyed Tree Frog

Pygmy Marsupial Frog

[wildlifemajor]

Chytridiomycosis for frogs is like if humans had eczema in their lungs.

You just die bro.

[toadschooled]

Amphibian 'apocalypse' caused by most destructive pathogen ever

The first-ever global tally of the disease's toll reveals that it caused declines in at least 501 frog and salamander species.

FOR DECADES, A silent killer has slaughtered frogs and salamanders around the world by eating their skins alive. Now, a global team of 41 scientists has announced that the pathogen—which humans unwittingly spread around the world—has damaged global biodiversity more than any other disease ever recorded.

The new study, published in Science on Thursday, is the first comprehensive tally of the damage done by the chytrid fungi Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd) and Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans (Bsal). In all, the fungi have driven the declines of at least 501 amphibian species, or about one out of every 16 known to science.

Of the chytrid-stricken species, 90 have gone extinct or are presumed extinct in the wild. Another 124 species have declined in number by more than 90 percent. All but one of the 501 declines was caused by Bd.

“We’ve known that's chytrid's really bad, but we didn't know how bad it was, and it's much worse than the previous early estimates,” says study leader Ben Scheele, an ecologist at Australian National University. “Our new results put it on the same scale, in terms of damage to biodiversity, as rats, cats, and [other] invasive species.”

[stickyfrogs]

The Stickyfrogs have had a Most Wonderful time this evening watching Very Excellent Frog Scientist Dr Jonathan Kolby @myfrogcroaked give his fantastic talk on Amphibian Chytrid at the OIE Conference in Chile.

(Voigt helped the most with Pats and Nipping)

You can see Dr Jonathan’s Excellent Talk at https://youtu.be/Cq9OSPCY3dc (8hrs 1min) 🐸😀

[sciencenewsforstudents]

Analyze This: Amphibian populations are on the decline

The chytrid fungus has been wiping out amphibians around the world. Scientists have tallied up the declines and found that the fungus is responsible for dozens of extinctions.

A deadly disease has been traveling the world for more than three decades now. Called Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis, or Bd, it’s a fungal pathogen that infects the skin of frogs, toads and other amphibians. A related fungus, B. salamandrivorans, infects salamanders and newts. Together, these pathogens are known as chytrids (KIH-trids) because the disease they cause is called chytridiomycosis (Kih-TRIH-dee-oh-my-oh-KOH-sis).

Scientists have known that these pathogens can be deadly. They have documented the effects that chytrids have had on amphibian populations. Now researchers have tallied up the effects of one chytrid, Bd, on species around the world. Their report appeared March 29 in the journal Science.

Bd has played a role in the decline of some 500 amphibian species in the past 50 years, the scientists found. Australia and the Americas have been especially hard hit. But these declines have been occurred around the world, except in Asia. That’s where the fungus is thought to originate.

The pathogen may be responsible for the extinction of as many as 90 species, the researchers report. Others are still in peril. About 40 percent of those 500 species are still declining in numbers. And about one in every four of those species now hold on at less than a tenth of their former population size.

Amphibian declines due to chytrid fungus in Mesoamerica

Central America, Mexico and the Caribbean Islands — a region known as Mesoamerica — has been hard hit by chytrid fungal infections. This chart divvies up species into how much their population numbers have declined due to the fungus. Graph: B.C. Scheele et al/Science 2019, Frog: B. Gratwicke/Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute 

[dendroica]

Deadly skin-eating fungal disease wipes out 90 amphibian species in 50 years | The Guardian

A deadly disease that wiped out global populations of amphibians led to the decline of 500 species in the past 50 years, including 90 extinctions, scientists say.

A global research effort, led by the Australian National University, has for the first time quantified the worldwide impact of chytridiomycosis, or chytrid fungus, a fungal disease that eats away at the skin of amphibians.

The disease was first discovered in 1998 by researchers at James Cook University in Queensland investigating the cause of mysterious, mass amphibian deaths.

Chytridiomycosis is caused by two fungal species, both of which are likely to have originated in Asia, and their spread has been facilitated by humans through activities such as the legal and illegal pet trade.

Forty-two researchers worked on the new study, published in Science on Friday, which pinpoints the extent of the disease and how devastating it has been for frog, toad and salamander species. They found evidence that at least 501 species had declined as a result of chytrid fungus and 90 of those were presumed or confirmed extinct.

“The results are pretty astounding” Benjamin Scheele, a research fellow at the ANU and the project’s lead researcher, said. “We’ve known that chytrid is really bad for the better part of two decades but actually researching and quantifying those declines, that’s what this study does.”

The scientists identified declines in amphibian species in Europe, Africa, Central and South America and Australia because of the disease. Scheele said there were no declines in Asia because species had evolved to be naturally resistant.

The impact of the disease has been hardest in Central and South America and in eastern Australia, where it flourishes in cool and moist conditions. It does not survive at temperatures above 28C.