Biomphalaria snails are instrumental in transmission of the human blood fluke Schistosoma mansoni. With the World Health Organization's goal to eliminate schistosomiasis as a global health problem by 2025, there is now renewed emphasis on snail control. Here, we characterize the genome of Biomphalaria glabrata, a lophotrochozoan protostome, and provide timely and important information on snail biology. We describe aspects of phero-perception, stress responses, immune function and regulation of gene expression that support the persistence of B. glabrata in the field and may define this species as a suitable snail host for S. mansoni. We identify several potential targets for developing novel control measures aimed at reducing snail-mediated transmission of schistosomiasis.

BackgroundFungi are among the most abundant and diverse organisms on Earth. However, a substantial amount of the species diversity, relationships, habitats, and life strategies of these microorganisms remain to be discovered and characterized. One important factor hindering progress is the difficulty in correctly identifying fungi. Morphological and molecular characteristics have been applied in such tasks. Later, DNA barcoding has emerged as a new method for the rapid and reliable identification of species. The nrITS region is considered the universal barcode of Fungi, and the ITS1 and ITS2 sub-regions have been applied as metabarcoding markers. In this study, we performed a large-scale analysis of all the available Basidiomycota sequences from GenBank. We carried out a rigorous trimming of the initial dataset based in methodological principals of DNA Barcoding. Two different approaches (PCI and barcode gap) were used to determine the performance of the complete ITS region and sub-regions.ResultsFor most of the Basidiomycota genera, the three genomic markers performed similarly, i.e., when one was considered a good marker for the identification of a genus, the others were also; the same results were observed when the performance was insufficient. However, based on barcode gap analyses, we identified genomic markers that had a superior identification performance than the others and genomic markers that were not indicated for the identification of some genera. Notably, neither the complete ITS nor the sub-regions were useful in identifying 11 of the 113 Basidiomycota genera. The complex phylogenetic relationships and the presence of cryptic species in some genera are possible explanations of this limitation and are discussed.ConclusionsKnowledge regarding the efficiency and limitations of the barcode markers that are currently used for the identification of organisms is crucial because it benefits research in many areas. Our study provides information that may guide researchers in choosing the most suitable genomic markers for identifying Basidiomycota species.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12866-017-0958-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

MicrobiomeDB (http://microbiomeDB.org) is a data discovery and analysis platform that empowers researchers to fully leverage experimental variables to interrogate microbiome datasets. MicrobiomeDB was developed in collaboration with the Eukaryotic Pathogens Bioinformatics Resource Center (http://EuPathDB.org) and leverages the infrastructure and user interface of EuPathDB, which allows users to construct in silico experiments using an intuitive graphical ‘strategy’ approach. The current release of the database integrates microbial census data with sample details for nearly 14 000 samples originating from human, animal and environmental sources, including over 9000 samples from healthy human subjects in the Human Microbiome Project (http://portal.ihmpdcc.org/). Query results can be statistically analyzed and graphically visualized via interactive web applications launched directly in the browser, providing insight into microbial community diversity and allowing users to identify taxa associated with any experimental covariate.

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