Symbiodiniaceae Dinoflagellate Culture Isolation

Two dinoflagellate culture isolates from the family Symbiodiniaceae: B. psygmophilum and E. voratum were obtained from the Marine Symbiosis and Coral Reef Biology laboratory at Victoria University of Wellington (New Zealand). The culture isolates had different cell sizes with the mean girdle diameter of B. psygmophilum 6.69 ± 0.83 µm and E. voratum 9.29 ± 0.77 µm. To start the cultures, approximately 100 cells mL ⁻¹of each isolate was used. The cultures were grown in f/2 growth medium enriched with nutrients (Guillard, 1975 ). They were maintained in sterile plastic flatbottomed vessels (70 mL Labserv, ThermoFisher Scientific, NZ) with a 12:12 light: dark cycle under 100 µmol m⁻² s⁻¹ photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) at 25 °C. All cultures were harvested during their late exponential phase prior to the freezing experiments.