About CoralMicrobes.org

CoralMicrobes.org is based at the Hollings Marine Laboratory (Charleston, SC, USA) and reflects a cooperative effort between the Medical University of South Carolina and Clemson University. The initial development of this website has been supported by the National Science Foundation, as part of a Biodiversity Surveys and Inventories (DEB0516347) award to Pam Morris (Medical University of South Carolina/Hollings Marine Laboratory), Karen Nelson (J. Craig Venter Institute) and Garriet Smith (University of South Carolina-Aiken). The objectives of this NSF award have focused on the diversity of coral-associated microorganisms in the Caribbean using culture-dependent and culture-independent approaches, and the data resulting from this award will all be publically accessible in the CoralMicrobes.org database.

The CoralMicrobes.org project has benefited from the support of the Marine Biomedicine and Environmental Sciences Center of the Medical University of South Carolina, and by the NOAA Center of Excellence in Oceans and Human Health at the Hollings Marine Laboratory. Additionally, the capabilities of this website have been greatly enhanced by the generous contributions of the Clemson University Genomics Institute and Clemson University’s Cyber Infrastructure Technology Integration group.

The goal of CoralMicrobes.org is to develop an interactive, public database to facilitate the global study of coral-associated microbial communities.  The database will incorporate information related to both culture-dependent and culture-independent assessment of microbial communities, as well as key metadata conforming to the Minimum Information about a Metagenomic Sequence/Sample (MIMS) standards.  Users will be able to search the database using a number of key parameters, and the site will take advantage of web services available through the Ribosomal Database Project.