A new clionaid sponge infests live corals on the west coast of India (Porifera, Demospongiae, Clionaida)

Differential Symbiodiniaceae Association With Coral and Coral-Eroding Sponge in a Bleaching Impacted Marginal Coral Reef Environment

“…C. thomasi investigated herein is a newly discovered ecologically important sponge species, abundant in the Indian Ocean coral reefs (Mote et al, 2019). Therefore, aggressive growth of this species on live corals raises serious concern about reefs health (Mote et al, 2019).…”

“…Shallow water nearshore coral reefs in this region are subjected to a broad range of chronic and acute stressors, which are considered suboptimal for coral reef development, including thermal stress-driven recurrent coral bleaching episodes (De et al, 2015(De et al, , 2021Hussain et al, 2016), coral diseases (Hussain et al, 2016), monsoonal freshwater influx, and anthropogenic perturbations like, siltation, turbidity, nutrient input, fishing, and intensive tourism-mediated damage (De et al, 2020). C. thomasi investigated herein is a newly discovered ecologically important sponge species, abundant in the Indian Ocean coral reefs (Mote et al, 2019). Therefore, aggressive growth of this species on live corals raises serious concern about reefs health (Mote et al, 2019).…”

“…For instance, species belonging to Cliona viridis species complex accounts for significant erosion of corals at the rate of >10 kg/m sponge area/year (Schönberg, 2000;Achlatis et al, 2019). The cosmopolitan sponge genus Cliona consists of 86 species (Van Soest et al, 2020), and among those, only about 25% of species are known to harbor symbiotic dinoflagellate communities (Achlatis, 2018;Mote et al, 2019). Studies have shown that algal symbionts of Cliona species provide their host with energetic inputs needed for excavating calcium carbonate through investment in photosynthates and/or photosynthesis by-products (Marlow et al, 2018;Achlatis et al, 2019).…”

Data_Sheet_3.xlsx

“…The shallow-water sponge species S. digitata and S. maeandrina contained three different Symbiodiniaceae genera (Cladocopium, Durusdinium, and Freudenthalidium). For C. thomasi, it was known that the species contains Symbiodiniaceae, but their identity was still unknown (Mote et al, 2019). We determined their molecular identity as Cladocopium sp.…”

“…Seven different species belonging to the family Clionaidae were observed in the present study and identified as: Cliona aff. orientalis, Cliona thomasi (Mote et al, 2019), Cliona utricularis (Calcinai et al 2005), a so far unidentified Cliona sp., Spheciospongia digitata (Dendy, 1887), Spheciospongia maeandrina (Dendy, 1887) and Spheciospongia trincomaliensis (Ridley, 1884) ( Supplementary Figure 4).…”