PAASE Video Primer

Hon. Fortunato T. de la Peña, Ph.D.

Secretary, Department of Science and Technology

PAASE extends its sincerest gratitude to Dr. Anabelle P. Villalobos and Dr. Alvin D. Culaba for their generous donations to the organization.

ABSTRACT

The marine ecosystem has become the hotspot for finding antibiotic-producing actinomycetes across the globe. Although marine-derived actinomycetes display strain-level genomic and chemodiversity, it is unclear whether functional traits, i.e., antibiotic activity, vary in near-identical Streptomyces species. Here, we report culture-dependent isolation, antibiotic activity, phylogeny, biodiversity, abundance, and distribution of Streptomyces isolated from marine sediments across the west-central Philippines. Out of 2212 marine sediment-derived actinomycete strains isolated from 11 geographical sites, 92 strains exhibited antibacterial activities against multidrug-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Escherichia coli. The 16S rRNA and rpoB gene sequence analyses confirmed that antibiotic-producing strains belong to the genus Streptomyces, highlighting Streptomyces parvulus as the most dominant species and three possible new species. Antibiotic-producing Streptomyces strains were highly diverse in Southern Antique, and species diversity increase with marine sediment depth. Multiple strains with near-identical 16S rRNA and rpoB gene sequences displayed varying strength of antibiotic activities. The genotyping of PKS and NRPS genes revealed that closely related antibiotic-producing strains have similar BGC domains supported by their close phylogenetic proximity. These findings collectively suggest Streptomyces' intraspecies adaptive characteristics in distinct ecological niches that resulted in outcompeting other bacteria through differential antibiotic production.

"Cecilia P. Reyes is an entomologist with extensive experience in teaching, research, extension, project coordination, and senior management with a demonstrated history of working in both government and non-government organizations for over twenty-five years. She relentlessly pushed the frontiers of scientific knowledge, expanded interdisciplinary collaborations, mentored junior researchers and students in public and private universities, and published research outputs.

Cecilia has published scientific papers in both international and national journals, and her research contributions that enriched the scientific knowledge include discoveries of 9 genera and 42 species of insects. She also pioneered the use of copepods as biological control agents of dengue mosquitoes in the Philippines. She is a member of professional and socio-civic organizations and recipient of prestigious national and international awards. She has lived and worked for an extended period in the National Capital Region, Regions 2, 3, and 12 in the Philippines, India, Canada, and the United States of America."

The program has support from the US National Science Foundation and is headed by Prof Roger Pielke Jr of University of Colorado at Boulder. Prof Pielke Jr is one of the world's leading scholars in environmental science policy. EsCAPE is also part of the policy research network of the International Network for Government Science Advice (INGSA) The Philippines team is supported by pro bono efforts of our Science, Technology and Society, (STS) scientists.

Dr Benjamin M Vallejo Jr of the UPD College of Science is the National Team Leader. The Philippines team has the following members at present, Asst Prof Ranjit Rye of UPD CSSP, and Dr Rodrigo Angelo C Ong, Professorial Lecturer at UPD Science and Society Program. There are 17 national science teams in the program. EsCAPE recognizes the excellent work done by Filipino scientists especially by OCTA Research on COVID-19.