Pathogen Blamed for Starfish Disease That Turns Them to 'Goo'

Scientists still don't understand the mysterious disease that is wasting starfish along the Pacific Coast, dissolving the animals until their arms drop off and they die.

But they do have a lead. Researchers believe the sickness, which has spread among sea stars from British Columbia to Mexico, stems from a bacterial or viral pathogen, CBC News reported.

First spotted last summer, the disease turns the starfish into "goo," causing their bodies to deteriorate until their arms drop off.

"We don't have an absolute answer yet," said Lesanna Lahner, a veterinarian at the Seattle Aquarium, as quoted by CBC. "We've narrowed in on it possibly being a pathogen, some sort of infectious source, bacterial or viral."

Oregon's starfish aren't immune either, as Oregon Coast Aquarium divers recently discovered. In late April, sunflower and ochre starfish on the state's coast were found to be devastated by the disease as well, The Oregonian reported.

"You see an arm totally off, or the base of a body really milky, or an arm starting to separate," Jim Burke, the aquarium's dive operations director, told The Oregonian. The divers found around 22 sea stars with disease symptoms and 30 healthy animals.

Starfish are animals especially vital to the marine ecosystem because of their predator nature.

"These are ecologically important species," said Drew Harvell, a marine epidemiologist from Cornell University Harvell, as quoted by NPR. "To remove them changes the entire dynamics of the marine ecosystem. When you lose this many sea stars it will certainly change the seascape underneath our waters."

According to the CBC report, the vicious illness has a 95 percent mortality rate when it takes over. Due to the nature of the disease, collecting specimens for study is especially difficult since the sick animals tend to dissolve rapidly.

Along the Pacific coast, Washington state has dozens of sites with diseased sea stars; Oregon has reported a few spots; and California has been hit the hardest. The sea star species with the highest death rates are the morning sun, mottled, giant pink, and purple sea stars, CBC reported.