Biogeography of pelagic bacterioplankton across an antagonistic temperature-salinity gradient in the Red Sea
Type
ArticleKAUST Department
Red Sea Research Center (RSRC)Biological and Environmental Sciences and Engineering (BESE) Division
Marine Science Program
Marine Microbial Ecology Research Group
Date
2011-12-01Online Publication Date
2011-12-01Print Publication Date
2012-01Permanent link to this record
http://hdl.handle.net/10754/561950
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Show full item recordAbstract
The Red Sea is a unique marine ecosystem with contrasting gradients of temperature and salinity along its north-to-south axis. It is an extremely oligotrophic environment that is characterized by perpetual year-round water column stratification, high annual solar irradiation, and negligible riverine and precipitation inputs. In this study, we investigated whether the contemporary environmental conditions shape community assemblages by pyrosequencing 16S rRNA genes of bacteria in surface water samples collected from the northeastern half of this water body. A combined total of 1855 operational taxonomic units (OTUs) were recovered from the 'small-cell' and 'large-cell' fractions. Here, a few major OTUs affiliated with Cyanobacteria and Proteobacteria accounted for â93% of all sequences, whereas a tail of 'rare' OTUs represented most of the diversity. OTUs allied to Surface 1a/b SAR11 clades and Prochlorococcus related to the high-light-adapted (HL2) ecotype were the most widespread and predominant sequence types. Interestingly, the frequency of taxa that are typically found in the upper mesopelagic zone was significantly elevated in the northern transects compared with those in the central, presumably as a direct effect of deep convective mixing in the Gulf of Aqaba and water exchange with the northern Red Sea. Although temperature was the best predictor of species richness across all major lineages, both spatial and environmental distances correlated strongly with phylogenetic distances. Our results suggest that the bacterial diversity of the Red Sea is as high as in other tropical seas and provide evidence for fundamental differences in the biogeography of pelagic communities between the northern and central regions. © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.Citation
NGUGI, D. K., ANTUNES, A., BRUNE, A., & STINGL, U. (2011). Biogeography of pelagic bacterioplankton across an antagonistic temperature-salinity gradient in the Red Sea. Molecular Ecology, 21(2), 388–405. doi:10.1111/j.1365-294x.2011.05378.xPublisher
WileyJournal
Molecular EcologyPubMed ID
22133021Relations
Is Supplemented By:- [Bioproject]
Title: Biogeography of pelagic bacterioplankton across an antagonistic temperature-salinity gradient in the Red SeaPublication Date: 2012-08-02. bioproject: PRJEB2645 Handle: 10754/666425
ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1111/j.1365-294X.2011.05378.x
Scopus Count
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