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Vibrio pectenicida strain FHCF-3 is a causative agent of sea star wasting disease

Nature Ecology & Evolution volume 9, pages 1739–1751 (2025)Cite this article

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Abstract

More than 10 years following the onset of the sea star wasting disease (SSWD) epidemic, affecting over 20 asteroid species from Mexico to Alaska, the causative agent has been elusive. SSWD killed billions of the most susceptible species, sunflower sea stars (Pycnopodia helianthoides), initiating a trophic cascade involving unchecked urchin population growth and the widespread loss of kelp forests. Identifying the causative agent underpins the development of recovery strategies. Here we induced disease and subsequent mortality in exposure experiments using tissue extracts, coelomic fluid and effluent water from wasting sunflower sea stars, with no mortality in controls. Deep sequencing of diseased sea star coelomic fluid samples from experiments and field outbreaks revealed a dominant proportion of reads assigned to the bacterium Vibrio pectenicida. Fulfilling Koch’s postulates, V. pectenicida strain FHCF-3, cultured from the coelomic fluid of a diseased sunflower sea star, caused disease and mortality in exposed sunflower sea stars, demonstrating that it is a causative agent of SSWD. This discovery will enable recovery efforts for sea stars and the ecosystems affected by their decline by facilitating culture-based experimental research and broad-scale screening for pathogen presence and abundance in the laboratory and field.

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Fig. 1: A conceptual overview of exposure experiments used to identify the causative agent of SSWD.
Fig. 2: The disease signs and trajectory of P. helianthoides exposed to SSWD.
Fig. 3: PCoA plot of a normalized contig count matrix of microbial species identified from metatranscriptomic sequencing data generated from controlled experimental exposures of P. helianthoides to SSWD.
Fig. 4: Relative read abundance of V. pectenicida in 16S V4 rRNA gene sequencing datasets.

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Data availability

Metatranscriptomic and 16S rRNA gene sequence datasets are archived in the NCBI Short Read Archive (BioProject no. PRJNA1195080). The whole-genome of V. pectenicida strain FHCF-3 is available from the NCBI GenBank Repository (accession no. JBLZMR000000000), with raw sequence reads archived in the NCBI Short Read Archive (BioProject no. PRJNA1232168). The complete 16S rRNA gene sequences of V. pectenicida strain FHCF-3 are deposited in the NCBI GenBank Repository (accessions PQ700178 and PQ763222–PQ763229). Source data are provided with this paper.

Code availability

Code generated in this study is available via Dryad at https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.5mkkwh7g9 (ref. 41).

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Acknowledgements

B. Blake and N. Siu helped to acquire permits for this work. K. Bachen, H. Carson, K. Collins, D. Currie-Olsen, T. Frierson, T. Froese, J. Kocian, E. Loose, Z. Monteith, O. Pontier, G. Sadlier-Brown, A. Schmill, K. Sowul, B. Stevick and D. VanMaanen assisted with field collections. F. Curliss, A. Kalytiak-Davis, C. Schwab and V. Valdez supported sea star transfers from and sample collections at Friday Harbor Laboratories. D. Rogers provided local shellfish to feed experimental stars. J. Beal, C. Grady, J. Gregg, A. MacKenzie and W. Richards provided facilities and logistical support at the USGS Marrowstone Marine Field Station and H. Kuttenkeuler, K. Rolheiser and M. Winningham aided experiment monitoring and sampling. Y. Gouin and A. Nimmon assisted with entering and collating data. C. L. J. Huang assisted with preparation of culture media. C. Burge, C. Conway, J. Hansen, A. Hawthorn, J. Lovy, A. Roberts and Q. Yang provided advice. Graphic illustrations are credited to M. Minck. We are grateful for the support from E. Peterson, C. Munck, N. Eddy and J. Wilson. Funding was provided by The Nature Conservancy of California (C.D.H. and A.-L.M.G.), the Tula Foundation (A.-L.M.G. and C.A.S.), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Discovery grant no. RPGIN-2020-06515 (C.A.S.), the Canadian Foundation for Innovation and British Columbia Knowledge Development Fund Infrastructure award no. 25412 (C.A.S.), the University of British Columbia, the USGS Biological Threats Research Program, Ecosystems Mission Area (P.K.H.) and the Quantitative and Evolutionary STEM Traineeship NRT-1735316 (A.M.). Any use of trade, firm or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the US government.

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Author notes

  1. Katherine M. Davis

    Present address: Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, Port Townsend, WA, USA

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

    Melanie B. Prentice, Amy M. Chan, Katherine M. Davis, Jan F. Finke, Kevin X. Zhong & Curtis A. Suttle

  2. Hakai Institute, Campbell River, British Colombia, Canada

    Melanie B. Prentice, Katherine M. Davis, Jan F. Finke, Colleen T. E. Kellogg, Rute B. G. Clemente-Carvalho, Carolyn Prentice & Alyssa-Lois M. Gehman

  3. School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA

    Grace A. Crandall

  4. US Geological Survey, Western Fisheries Research Center, Marrowstone Marine Field Station, Nordland, WA, USA

    Paul K. Hershberger

  5. Friday Harbor Laboratories, University of Washington, Friday Harbor, WA, USA

    Jason Hodin & C. Drew Harvell

  6. Department of Biology, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT, USA

    Andrew McCracken

  7. Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

    Colleen T. E. Kellogg, Curtis A. Suttle & Alyssa-Lois M. Gehman

  8. Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA

    C. Drew Harvell

  9. Department of Microbiology & Immunology, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

    Curtis A. Suttle

  10. Department of Botany, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

    Curtis A. Suttle

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Contributions

Conceptualization: M.B.P., G.A.C., A.M.C., K.M.D., P.K.H., J.F.F., C.D.H., C.A.S., A.-L.M.G. Methodology: M.B.P., G.A.C., A.M.C., K.M.D., P.K.H., C.T.E.K., C.D.H., C.A.S., A.-L.M.G. Formal analysis: M.B.P., A.M.C., K.X.Z., A.-L.M.G. Investigation: M.B.P., G.A.C., A.M.C., K.M.D., A.M., R.B.G.C.-C., C.P., A.-L.M.G. Resources: M.B.P., G.A.C., K.M.D., P.K.H., J.H., A.M., C.A.S., A.-L.M.G. Data curation: M.B.P., G.A.C., A.M.C., K.M.D., C.P., A.-L.M.G. Writing—original draft: M.B.P., A.-L.M.G. Writing—review and editing: M.B.P., G.A.C., A.M.C., K.M.D., P.K.H., J.F.F., J.H., A.M., C.T.E.K., R.B.G.C.-C., C.P., K.X.Z., C.D.H., C.A.S., A.-L.M.G. Visualization: M.B.P., K.X.Z., A.-L.M.G. Supervision: A.M.C., C.D.H., C.A.S., A.-L.M.G. Funding acquisition: A.M.C., C.D.H., C.A.S., A.-L.M.G.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Melanie B. Prentice or Alyssa-Lois M. Gehman.

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Extended data

Extended Data Fig. 1 The disease trajectory of captive-bred (“lab”, n = 4) and wild (“wild”, n = 4) sunflower sea stars (Pycnopodia helianthoides) following injection with coelomic fluid from a diseased sunflower sea star.

Data represents 8 individual mortalities observed in sunflower sea stars exposed to sea star wasting disease (excluding 2 individuals that were exposed but did not die). Host responses are grouped into three types, arm twisting (‘twist’), arm autotomy (‘drop’) and mortality (‘mort’). Symbols indicate the average number of days post exposure when disease responses were observed. The error bars indicate 1 s.e. We confirmed the presence of V. pectenicida in the inoculum used to start this experiment using 16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing (Supplementary Table 11).

Source data

Extended Data Fig. 2 Model predicted values of the number of arms twisted in sunflower sea stars (Pycnopodia helianthoides) following controlled exposure to sea star wasting disease by exposure method.

Lines indicate adjusted predicted values for stars within exposed (blue) and control (orange) treatment groups with 95% confidence intervals. Exposure methods include stars injected with coelomic fluid (‘CF’), tissue homogenate (‘homogenate’), or Vibrio pectenicida culture (‘culture’), and stars exposed to effluent water from a wasting sea stars tank (‘water’). Statistical results can be found in Supplementary Table 3.

Source data

Extended Data Fig. 3 Phylogenetic relationship of 16S rRNA gene sequence of V. pectenicida strain FHCF-3 (this study) to other Vibrio spp.

Vibrio spp. 16S rRNA gene sequences were retrieved from the SILVA rRNA gene database (version 138.1) and the NCBI nr database (as of 14 November 2024). The maximum-likelihood phylogeny was built using 1,000 replicates, and rooted with sequences from two strains of Escherichia coli (NCBI Accessions CP033092 and MT215717) as an outgroup. Values on the nodes of the phylogeny represent bootstrap values. V. pectenicida strain FHCF-3 (isolated and sequenced in this study) is highlighted in red.

Supplementary information

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Supplementary Data 1

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Supplementary Data 2

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Supplementary Data 3

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Prentice, M.B., Crandall, G.A., Chan, A.M. et al. Vibrio pectenicida strain FHCF-3 is a causative agent of sea star wasting disease. Nat Ecol Evol 9, 1739–1751 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-025-02797-2

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