A transcriptomic study reveals that fish vibriosis due to the zoonotic pathogen Vibrio vulnificus is an acute inflammatory disease.

Vibrio vulnificus is a marine zoonotic pathogen associated with fish farms that is considered a biomarker of climate change. Zoonotic strains trigger a rapid death of their susceptible hosts (fish or humans) by septicemia that has been linked to a cytokine storm in mice. A toxin called RtxA1 produced by the bacteria might play an important role in bacterial invasion and subsequent death by septic shock since animals infected with a mutant deficient in rtxA1 suffer from septicemia but do not die. The aim of this study was to globally analyze the early eel immune response in blood against V. vulnificus, as well as the role of the RtxA1 toxin on this interaction. We used the eel immersion infection model and then analyzed the transcriptome in RBCs, white BCs, and whole blood using an eel-specific microarray platform.