Laminated microbial mats are important ecosystem components of perennially ice‐covered Antarctic dry valley lakes. In order to understand better their response to changing environment, we made observations and carried out a manipulation experiment to determine their response to variations in irradiance in Lake Hoare (77°38′ S, 162°53′ E). Ice transparency was the most variable parameter that affected benthic light dose, both spatially and between years. Patterns of lamina accrual corresponded to irradiance history, with laminae that were initiated in high transmission years thicker than those from low transmission years. A shading experiment confirmed that accrual of lamina thickness, calcite precipitation and ash‐free dry mass were determined by irradiance, but photosynthetic biomass and phototrophic species composition were less affected. Buried laminae decomposed only slowly over time, with potentially viable phototrophs many laminae down into the microbial mat. Decay rate increased only slightly with shading. We conclude that the microbial mats in Lake Hoare are characterised by remarkable stability, with slow accumulation rates and turnover of biomass over time. Photosynthetic biomass and species composition appeared to be stable across long time periods, with interannual variation in lamination pattern due to differential accumulation of extracellular polysaccharide and representing the visible expression of annual growth conditions.
Antibiotic resistance genes and taxa analysis from mat and planktonic microbiomes of Antarctic perennial ice-covered Lake Fryxell and Lake Bonney
Abstract The perennial ice-covered lakes of the Antarctic McMurdo Dry Valleys harbour oligotrophic microbial communities that are separated geographically from other aquatic systems. Their microbiomes include planktonic microbes as well as lift-off mat communities that emerge from the ice. We used the ShortBRED protein family profiler to quantify the antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) from metagenomes of lift-off mats emerging from ice and from filtered water samples of Lake Fryxell and Lake Bonney. The overall proportion of ARG hits was similar to that found in temperate-zone rural ponds with moderate human inputs. Specific ARGs showed distinct distributions for the two lakes and for mat vs planktonic sources. Metagenomic taxa distributions showed that mat phototrophs consisted mainly of cyanobacteria or Betaproteobacteria, whereas the water column phototrophs were mainly protists. An enrichment culture of the Betaproteobacterium Rhodoferax antarcticus from a Lake Fryxell mat sample showed an unusual mat-forming phenotype not previously reported for this species. Its genome showed no ARGs associated with Betaproteobacteria but had ARGs consistent with a minor Pseudomonas component. The Antarctic lake mats and water showed specific ARGs distinctive to the mat and water sources, but overall ARG levels were similar to those of temperate water bodies with moderate human inputs.
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 1923077
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10425685
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Antarctic Science
- Volume:
- 34
- Issue:
- 6
- ISSN:
- 0954-1020
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 408 to 422
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
Growth dynamics of a laminated microbial mat in response to variable irradiance in an Antarctic lakemore » « less
Summary -
Blooms of planktonic cyanobacteria have long been of concern in lakes, but more recently, harmful impacts of riverine benthic cyanobacterial mats been recognized. As yet, we know little about how various benthic cyanobacteria are distributed in river networks, or how environmental conditions or other associated microbes in their consortia affect their biosynthetic capacities. We performed metagenomic sequencing for 22 Oscillatoriales-dominated (Cyanobacteria) microbial mats collected across the Eel River network in Northern California and investigated factors associated with anatoxin-a producing cyanobacteria. All microbial communities were dominated by one or two cyanobacterial species, so the key mat metabolisms involve oxygenic photosynthesis and carbon oxidation. Only a few metabolisms fueled the growth of the mat communities, with little evidence for anaerobic metabolic pathways. We genomically defined four cyanobacterial species, all which shared <96% average nucleotide identity with reference Oscillatoriales genomes and are potentially novel species in the genus Microcoleus. One of the Microcoleus species contained the anatoxin-a biosynthesis genes, and we describe the first anatoxin-a gene cluster from the Microcoleus clade within Oscillatoriales. Occurrence of these four Microcoleus species in the watershed was correlated with total dissolved nitrogen and phosphorus concentrations, and the species that contains the anatoxin-a gene cluster was found in sites with higher nitrogen concentrations. Microbial assemblages in mat samples with the anatoxin-a gene cluster consistently had a lower abundance of Burkholderiales (Betaproteobacteria) species than did mats without the anatoxin-producing genes. The associations of water nutrient concentrations and certain co-occurring microbes with anatoxin-a producing Microcoleus motivate further exploration for their roles as potential controls on the distributions of toxigenic benthic cyanobacteria in river networks.more » « less
-
more » « less
Abstract Blooms of planktonic cyanobacteria have long been of concern in lakes, but more recently, harmful impacts of riverine benthic cyanobacterial mats been recognized. As yet, we know little about how various benthic cyanobacteria are distributed in river networks, or how environmental conditions or other associated microbes in their consortia affect their biosynthetic capacities. We performed metagenomic sequencing for 22 Oscillatoriales-dominated (Cyanobacteria) microbial mats collected across the Eel River network in Northern California and investigated factors associated with anatoxin-a producing cyanobacteria. All microbial communities were dominated by one or two cyanobacterial species, so the key mat metabolisms involve oxygenic photosynthesis and carbon oxidation. Only a few metabolisms fueled the growth of the mat communities, with little evidence for anaerobic metabolic pathways. We genomically defined four cyanobacterial species, all which shared <96% average nucleotide identity with reference Oscillatoriales genomes and are potentially novel species in the genus Microcoleus. One of the Microcoleus species contained the anatoxin-a biosynthesis genes, and we describe the first anatoxin-a gene cluster from the Microcoleus clade within Oscillatoriales. Occurrence of these four Microcoleus species in the watershed was correlated with total dissolved nitrogen and phosphorus concentrations, and the species that contains the anatoxin-a gene cluster was found in sites with higher nitrogen concentrations. Microbial assemblages in mat samples with the anatoxin-a gene cluster consistently had a lower abundance of Burkholderiales (Betaproteobacteria) species than did mats without the anatoxin-producing genes. The associations of water nutrient concentrations and certain co-occurring microbes with anatoxin-a producing Microcoleus motivate further exploration for their roles as potential controls on the distributions of toxigenic benthic cyanobacteria in river networks.
-
ABSTRACT Ecological communities are regulated by the flow of energy through environments. Energy flow is typically limited by access to photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) and oxygen concentration (O2). The microbial mats growing on the bottom of Lake Fryxell, Antarctica, have well-defined environmental gradients in PAR and (O2). We analyzed the metagenomes of layers from these microbial mats to test the extent to which access to oxygen and light controls community structure. We found variation in the diversity and relative abundances of Archaea, Bacteria and Eukaryotes across three (O2) and PAR conditions: high (O2) and maximum PAR, variable (O2) with lower maximum PAR, and low (O2) and maximum PAR. We found distinct communities structured by the optimization of energy use on a millimeter-scale across these conditions. In mat layers where (O2) was saturated, PAR structured the community. In contrast, (O2) positively correlated with diversity and affected the distribution of dominant populations across the three habitats, suggesting that meter-scale diversity is structured by energy availability. Microbial communities changed across covarying gradients of PAR and (O2). The comprehensive metagenomic analysis suggests that the benthic microbial communities in Lake Fryxell are structured by energy flow across both meter- and millimeter-scales.more » « less
-
Persistent cold temperatures, a paucity of nutrients, freeze-thaw cycles, and the strongly seasonal light regime make Antarctica one of Earth’s least hospitable surface environments for complex life. Cyanobacteria, however, are well-adapted to such conditions and are often the dominant primary producers in Antarctic inland water environments. In particular, the network of meltwater ponds on the ‘dirty ice’ of the McMurdo Ice Shelf is an ecosystem with extensive cyanobacteria-dominated microbial mat accumulations. This study investigated intact polar lipids (IPLs), heterocyte glycolipids (HGs), and bacteriohopanepolyols (BHPs) in combination with 16S and 18S rRNA gene diversity in microbial mats of twelve ponds in this unique polar ecosystem. To constrain the effects of nutrient availability, temperature and freeze-thaw cycles on the lipid membrane composition, lipids were compared to stromatolite-forming cyanobacterial mats from ice-covered lakes in the McMurdo Dry Valleys as well as from (sub)tropical regions and hot springs. The 16S rRNA gene compositions of the McMurdo Ice Shelf mats confirm the dominance of Cyanobacteria and Proteobacteria while the 18S rRNA gene composition indicates the presence of Ochrophyta, Chlorophyta, Ciliophora, and other microfauna. IPL analyses revealed a predominantly bacterial community in the meltwater ponds, with archaeal lipids being barely detectable. IPLs are dominated by glycolipids and phospholipids, followed by aminolipids. The high abundance of sugar-bound lipids accords with a predominance of cyanobacterial primary producers. The phosphate-limited samples from the (sub)tropical, hot spring, and Lake Vanda sites revealed a higher abundance of aminolipids compared to those of the nitrogen-limited meltwater ponds, affirming the direct affects that N and P availability have on IPL compositions. The high abundance of polyunsaturated IPLs in the Antarctic microbial mats suggests that these lipids provide an important mechanism to maintain membrane fluidity in cold environments. High abundances of HG keto-ols and HG keto-diols, produced by heterocytous cyanobacteria, further support these findings and reveal a unique distribution compared to those from warmer climates.more » « less
- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
-
Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1017/S0954102022000360
