Abstract
Heterotrophic bacteria isolated from five aquatic microbial mat samples from different locations in continental Antarctica and the Antarctic Peninsula were compared to assess their biodiversity. A total of 2,225 isolates obtained on different media and at different temperatures were included. After an initial grouping by whole-genome fingerprinting, partial 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis was used for further identification. These results were compared with previously published data obtained with the same methodology from terrestrial and aquatic microbial mat samples from two additional Antarctic regions. The phylotypes recovered in all these samples belonged to five major phyla, Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Proteobacteria, Firmicutes and Deinococcus-Thermus, and included several potentially new taxa. Ordination analyses were performed in order to explore the variance in the diversity of the samples at genus level. Habitat type (terrestrial vs. aquatic) and specific conductivity in the lacustrine systems significantly explained the variation in bacterial community structure. Comparison of the phylotypes with sequences from public databases showed that a considerable proportion (36.9%) is currently known only from Antarctica. This suggests that in Antarctica, both cosmopolitan taxa and taxa with limited dispersal and a history of long-term isolated evolution occur.
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Acknowledgments
This work was funded by the Belgian Science Policy Office (BelSPO) projects AMBIO (an International Polar Year project), ANTAR-IMPACT and BELDIVA. Fieldwork was supported by BelSPO and the International Polar Foundation, the British Antarctic Survey and the Japanese Antarctic Research expedition 48. We thank the project coordinator Annick Wilmotte and are grateful to the Antarctic programme coordinator of BelSPO and Sakae Kudoh, Satoshi Imura and Tamotsu Hoshino for logistic support during sampling campaigns. This study contributes to the BAS ‘Polar Science for Planet Earth’ and SCAR ‘Evolution and Biodiversity in Antarctica’ programmes. EV is a postdoctoral research fellow with the Research Foundation – Flanders (Belgium).
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Peeters, K., Verleyen, E., Hodgson, D.A. et al. Heterotrophic bacterial diversity in aquatic microbial mat communities from Antarctica. Polar Biol 35, 543–554 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00300-011-1100-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00300-011-1100-4