Permafrost microbial communities follow shifts in vegetation, soils, and megafauna extinctions in Late Pleistocene NW North America
Abstract We analyzed the microbial constituent of sedimentary ancient DNA sequence data recovered from subarctic loessal permafrost sediments dating between 30,000 and 4000 years ago. These data were originally studied for paleo‐ecological shifts in plants and animals associated with the Pleistocene...
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crwiley:10.1002/edn3.493 2024-06-09T07:46:40+00:00 Permafrost microbial communities follow shifts in vegetation, soils, and megafauna extinctions in Late Pleistocene NW North America Murchie, Tyler J. Long, George S. Lanoil, Brian D. Froese, Duane Poinar, Hendrik N. Belmont Forum Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada 2023 http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/edn3.493 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/edn3.493 en eng Wiley http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Environmental DNA volume 5, issue 6, page 1759-1779 ISSN 2637-4943 2637-4943 journal-article 2023 crwiley https://doi.org/10.1002/edn3.493 2024-05-16T14:23:22Z Abstract We analyzed the microbial constituent of sedimentary ancient DNA sequence data recovered from subarctic loessal permafrost sediments dating between 30,000 and 4000 years ago. These data were originally studied for paleo‐ecological shifts in plants and animals associated with the Pleistocene–Holocene transition. Here, we explore whether there were changes in microbial communities paralleling the transition from distinctive cold‐adapted Ice Age megafauna and vegetation communities—the mammoth steppe ecosystem—toward the expansion of woody shrubs, extirpation of grazing megaherbivores, and development of the boreal forest. We observe a clear shift in the relative proportions of prokaryotic taxa after ca. 13,300 years ago associated with the collapse of the mammoth steppe. These data are consistent among study sites and between replicates processed with different methodologies (shotgun sequencing and targeted capture), which highlights that the “off‐target” fraction of metagenomic data used to study macro‐ecosystems can also be used to investigate synchronous changes in microbial communities. Functional analyses were performed with SEED and KEGG databases where we observed a shift in methane metabolism pathways after ~13,100 years ago, which suggests that there was a shift in methanogenesis away from animal gut microflora at the end of the Pleistocene. There does not appear to be a significant shift in the overall diversity of microbial communities despite the observed taxonomic and functional changes. Article in Journal/Newspaper Ice permafrost Subarctic Wiley Online Library Environmental DNA 5 6 1759 1779 |
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English |
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Abstract We analyzed the microbial constituent of sedimentary ancient DNA sequence data recovered from subarctic loessal permafrost sediments dating between 30,000 and 4000 years ago. These data were originally studied for paleo‐ecological shifts in plants and animals associated with the Pleistocene–Holocene transition. Here, we explore whether there were changes in microbial communities paralleling the transition from distinctive cold‐adapted Ice Age megafauna and vegetation communities—the mammoth steppe ecosystem—toward the expansion of woody shrubs, extirpation of grazing megaherbivores, and development of the boreal forest. We observe a clear shift in the relative proportions of prokaryotic taxa after ca. 13,300 years ago associated with the collapse of the mammoth steppe. These data are consistent among study sites and between replicates processed with different methodologies (shotgun sequencing and targeted capture), which highlights that the “off‐target” fraction of metagenomic data used to study macro‐ecosystems can also be used to investigate synchronous changes in microbial communities. Functional analyses were performed with SEED and KEGG databases where we observed a shift in methane metabolism pathways after ~13,100 years ago, which suggests that there was a shift in methanogenesis away from animal gut microflora at the end of the Pleistocene. There does not appear to be a significant shift in the overall diversity of microbial communities despite the observed taxonomic and functional changes. |
author2 |
Belmont Forum Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Murchie, Tyler J. Long, George S. Lanoil, Brian D. Froese, Duane Poinar, Hendrik N. |
spellingShingle |
Murchie, Tyler J. Long, George S. Lanoil, Brian D. Froese, Duane Poinar, Hendrik N. Permafrost microbial communities follow shifts in vegetation, soils, and megafauna extinctions in Late Pleistocene NW North America |
author_facet |
Murchie, Tyler J. Long, George S. Lanoil, Brian D. Froese, Duane Poinar, Hendrik N. |
author_sort |
Murchie, Tyler J. |
title |
Permafrost microbial communities follow shifts in vegetation, soils, and megafauna extinctions in Late Pleistocene NW North America |
title_short |
Permafrost microbial communities follow shifts in vegetation, soils, and megafauna extinctions in Late Pleistocene NW North America |
title_full |
Permafrost microbial communities follow shifts in vegetation, soils, and megafauna extinctions in Late Pleistocene NW North America |
title_fullStr |
Permafrost microbial communities follow shifts in vegetation, soils, and megafauna extinctions in Late Pleistocene NW North America |
title_full_unstemmed |
Permafrost microbial communities follow shifts in vegetation, soils, and megafauna extinctions in Late Pleistocene NW North America |
title_sort |
permafrost microbial communities follow shifts in vegetation, soils, and megafauna extinctions in late pleistocene nw north america |
publisher |
Wiley |
publishDate |
2023 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/edn3.493 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/edn3.493 |
genre |
Ice permafrost Subarctic |
genre_facet |
Ice permafrost Subarctic |
op_source |
Environmental DNA volume 5, issue 6, page 1759-1779 ISSN 2637-4943 2637-4943 |
op_rights |
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1002/edn3.493 |
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Environmental DNA |
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5 |
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6 |
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1759 |
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1779 |
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1801376620591710208 |