Sponges show the highest diversity of associated bacteria among marine invertebrates. Immunological evidence traces the origin of the sponge bacterial symbioses to the Precambrian era. Hence, sponges appear to be ideally suited for studying the evolutionary origins of prokaryote-metazoan associations. Sponges produce either calcareous or siliceous skeletons, which only coexist in a relict group...

In the course of our continuing efforts to identify bioactive secondary metabolites from Red Sea marine invertebrates, we have investigated the sponge Hemimycale arabica. The antimicrobial fraction of an organic extract of the sponge afforded two new hydantoin alkaloids, hemimycalins A and B (2 and 3), together with the previously reported compound (Z)-5-(4-hydroxybenzylidene)imidazolidine-2,4-...

Ubiquitination of proteins is a critical step in the controlled degradation process of many polypeptides. Here we show that sponges, the simplest multicellular group of eukaryotic organisms, are also equipped with the ubiquitin pathway. The polyubiquitin cDNA was isolated and characterized from the marine sponge Geodia cydonium. The open reading frame contains six ubiquitin moieties, which are ...

Three known nucleosides were isolated from the sponge Haliclona sp. The structures were established on the basis of NMR data and comparison with those reported, and chemotaxonomic relationships of the sponge nucleosides were discussed.

Sponge-associated fungi represent the single most prolific source of novel natural products from marine fungi. Cyclo (L-Trp-L-Phe) exhibits biological functions such as plant growth regulation, moderate cytotoxicity and thus has the application potential in pharmaceutical and agricultural biotechnologies. In this study, a fungal strain TS08 was isolated from sponge Holoxea sp. in the South Chin...

Sponges have a significant impact on marine benthic communities, they are of biotechnological interest owing to their production of bioactive natural compounds, and they promise to provide insights into conserved mechanisms of host-microbe interactions in basal metazoans. The natural variability of sponge-microbe associations across species and environments provides a meaningful ecological and ...

A paradigm shift has recently transformed the field of biological science; molecular advances have revealed how fundamentally important microorganisms are to many aspects of a host's phenotype and evolution. In the process, an era of "holobiont" research has emerged to investigate the intricate network of interactions between a host and its symbiotic microbial consortia. Marine sponges are earl...

This study was carried out to evaluate the microbiological accumulation capability of the demosponge Spongia officinalis var. adriatica. Six microbiological parameters were researched in two sampling periods in the water and in reared sponge samples coming from sites with different degrees of microbial contamination: an off-shore fish farm displaced off the Apulian coast (Southern Adriatic Sea)...

The sponge fauna has been largely overlooked in the Archipelago of Hawai'i, notwithstanding the paramount role of this taxon in marine ecosystems. The lack of knowledge about Porifera populations inhabiting the Hawai'ian reefs limits the development of ecological studies aimed at understanding the functioning of these marine systems. Consequently, this project addresses this gap by describing t...

In sessile marine invertebrates, larval settlement is fundamental to population maintenance and persistence. Cues contributing to the settlement choices and metamorphosis of larvae have important implications for the success of individuals and populations, but cues mediating larval settlement for many marine invertebrates are largely unknown. This study assessed larval settlement in two common ...