The symbiont-associated (SA) environmental package is a new extension to the minimum information about any (x) sequence (MIxS) standards, established by the Parasite Microbiome Project (PMP) consortium, in collaboration with the Genomics Standard Consortium. The SA was built upon the host-associated MIxS standard, but reflects the nestedness of symbiont-associated microbiota within and across host-symbiont-microbe interactions. This package is designed to facilitate the collection and reporting of a broad range of metadata information that apply to symbionts such as life history traits, association with one or multiple host organisms, or the nature of host-symbiont interactions along the mutualism-parasitism continuum. To better reflect the inherent nestedness of all biological systems, we present a novel feature that allows users to co-localize samples, to nest a package within another package, and to identify replicates. Adoption of the MIxS-SA and of the new terms will facilitate reports of complex sampling design from a myriad of environments.

ANSES Agence Nationale de Sécurité Sanitaire de l'Alimentation de l'Environnement et du Travail Laboratoire de Ploufragan Plouzané Unité Génétique Virale de Biosécurité Ploufragan France

Anses INRAE Ecole Nationale Vétérinaire d'Alfort UMR VIROLOGIE Laboratoire de Santé Animale 94700 Maisons Alfort France

Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences East Boothbay ME USA

Biology and Health Sciences Department Hendrix College Conway AR USA

Biology Department University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Chapel Hill NC USA

College of Marine Science University of South Florida Saint Petersburg FL USA

CREES Montpellier France

Data Collaboration Center Critical Path Institute Tucson AZ USA

Department of Biological Sciences University of Pittsburgh Pittsburgh PA 15260 USA

Department of Biology The City College of New York New York NY 10031 USA

Department of Infectious Diseases Foodborne and Neglected Parasitic Diseases; European Union Reference Laboratory for Parasite Istituto Superiore di Sanità Rome Italy

Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology University of Wisconsin Madison Madison WI USA

Department of Microbiology Immunology and Tropical Medicine School of Medicine and Health Sciences George Washington University Washington D C 20037 USA

Department of Natural History NTNU University Museum Norwegian University of Science and Technology Trondheim Norway

Department of Obstetrics Gynecology and Reproductive Biology Brigham and Women's Hospital Harvard Medical School Boston MA USA

Department of Veterinary Medicine University of Cambridge Cambridge CB3 0ES UK

Department of Zoology University of Otago Dunedin New Zealand

GigaDB Director GigaScience Press BGI Hong Kong Hong Kong China

Institut de Recherche sur la Biologie de l'Insecte UMR 7261 CNRS Université de Tours Avenue Monge Parc Grandmont 37200 Tours France

Institute for Genome Sciences Department of Epidemiology and Public Health University of Maryland School of Medicine Baltimore MD 21201 USA

Institute of Parasitology Biology Centre Czech Academy of Sciences and Faculty of Sciences University of South Bohemia České Budějovice České Budějovice Czech Republic

MIVEGEC Montpellier France

New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene Long Island City NY USA

Northern Gulf Institute Mississippi State University Mississippi State MS 39762 USA

Ocean Chemistry and Ecosystems Division Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Miami FL 33149 USA

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