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Note: Zak Swartz, an assitant scientist at the ߣ����Ƶ's Bell Center, was quoted in this story.

Columbo, eat your heart out: A team of scientists has just solved a massive marine murder mystery, nabbing the culprit behind the deaths of billions of sea stars over the past decade.

In a new study, researchers in the U.S. and Canada argue that the bacterial cousin of cholera is behind the epidemic. Through a series of experiments involving both wild and captive sea stars, they found evidence that Vibrio pectenicida is the likely cause of sea star wasting disease—a devastating condition that causes the invertebrates to decay and essentially “melt.”

The team’s findings appear to be well supported with evidence, Zak Swartz, a biologist specializing in sea stars at the Marine Biological Laboratory who was not involved with the study, told Gizmodo.

“This study definitely passes the sniff test for me. It seems quite convincing that V. pectenicida bacteria are at least one causative agent of SSWS,” Swartz said. .