Microbial-Based Therapies to Restore and Rehabilitate Disrupted Coral Health

Abstract

Corals are facing diverse threats that disrupt their microbial symbioses, leading to changes in microbiome assemblage as a response to environmental stress. This shift affects coral physiology and resilience and is often signified by a dysbiotic state where beneficial microbes are replaced by pathogenic ones. At the same time, the malleability of the microbial assemblage provides an opportunity for intervention through targeted management of the microbiome to restore or rehabilitate disrupted coral health, a concept coined microbiome stewardship. Different approaches have been proposed to regulate and modulate, i.e., manage, the coral microbiome, such as the use of probiotics, prebiotics, postbiotics, microbiome transplantation, or phage therapy. Additionally, leveraging the sea anemone Aiptasia (sensu Exaiptasia diaphana) as a model organism may accelerate discovery of microbiome control mechanisms and beneficial bacteria, thus informing the development of intervention techniques. Recent results have validated the efficacy of microbiome-targeted interventions, showing substantial improvements in coral resilience in both laboratory settings and field trials. Such advancements hold implications beyond the realm of coral reefs for planetary health and ecosystem stability.