Sponge associated fungi. The sponge mycobiome.

Marine sponges are widespread, sessile, filter feeding animals, known for living in association with complex prokaryotic communities structured by host species. Despite marine fungi are ubiquitous across marine environments, little is known about sponge-associated mycobiomes. Indeed, aside from few studies based on isolating and culturing fungi from Porifera for biotechnological purposes, no information is described on the diversity and structure of sponge associated fungi. Here, a metabarcoding approach based on the ITS1 marker was applied to examine the structure and composition of the fungal communities associated with Mediterranean sponges. To this aim four species: Petrosia ficiformis, Chondrosia reniformis, Crambe crambe and Chondrilla nucula were analyzed along with the surrounding seawater.