AquaBiomics Results

When I heard AquaBiomics was shutting its doors (and with no other alternatives in the market), it was now or never for ordering a Microbiome test. Thankfully, I was able to catch one of the last 4 batches. I collected my sample by the end of July and didn’t receive my results until today. It took quite some time from when the sample was batched/sequenced, to when the reports were generated. He must have wanted to do them all at once for the last and final time. I thought I would share some of my results, so we can shame the biome and pathogens in my tank together. Buyer beware if you get corals from my tank!!1! What you don’t know can’t hurt you (maybe). It looks like my microbiome is average in diversity, but well balanced in the distribution of bacteria. Diversity

• list item“A score of 355 places your tank in the 51st percentile — right in line with the typical reef tank in our reference dataset.”

Balance

• list item“A score of 0.68 places your tank in the 94th percentile — the community closely matches the typical mature reef tank.“

The community of biomes looks like there are a few microbial families that differ from most other tanks in the data set. The differences indicate I have high DOCs which will negatively impact my biome overall. Excess families (higher than typical)

• Mycobacteriaceae - often associated with Fish TB
• Lachnospiraceae - strongly indicates excess organic waste
• Bacteroidaceae

Deficient families (lower than typical)

• Pelagibacteraceae - free-living bacteria that thrive in clean, low-nutrient waters
• Flavobacteriaceae
• Alteromonadaceae - reduces your tanks natural biological resilience

Nitrifying Community, looks like I have plenty of Ammonia-Oxidizing Microbes, but am lacking in Nitrite-Oxidizing Bacteria. Nitrifying microbes are detected in 97% of tanks (AOM) and 49% of tanks (NOB) in our reference dataset. Looks like I should try increasing my NOBs.