Environmental rather than spatial factors structure bacterioplankton communities in shallow lakes along a > 6000 km latitudinal gradient in South America

Summary Metacommunity studies on lake bacterioplankton indicate the importance of environmental factors in structuring communities. Yet most of these studies cover relatively small spatial scales. We assessed the relative importance of environmental and spatial factors in shaping bacterioplankton co...

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Published in:Environmental Microbiology
Main Authors: Souffreau, Caroline, Van der Gucht, Katleen, van Gremberghe, Ineke, Kosten, Sarian, Lacerot, Gissell, Lobão, Lúcia Meirelles, de Moraes Huszar, Vera Lúcia, Roland, Fabio, Jeppesen, Erik, Vyverman, Wim, De Meester, Luc
Other Authors: Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO), National Geographic Society, Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq), Programa de Desarrollo de las Ciencias Básicas (PEDECIBA), Maestría en Ciencias Ambientales, Donación Aguas de la Costa S.A., Banco de Seguros del Estado, National Fund for Scientific Research, Flanders (FWO), KU Leuven Research Fund Excellence Center, Centre for Regional change in the Earth System (CRES), Centre for Informatics Research on Complexity in Ecology (CIRCE)
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Wiley 2015
Subjects:
Tundra
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1462-2920.12692
https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1111%2F1462-2920.12692
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/wol1/doi/10.1111/1462-2920.12692/fullpdf
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Summary:Summary Metacommunity studies on lake bacterioplankton indicate the importance of environmental factors in structuring communities. Yet most of these studies cover relatively small spatial scales. We assessed the relative importance of environmental and spatial factors in shaping bacterioplankton communities across a > 6000 km latitudinal range, studying 48 shallow lowland lakes in the tropical, tropical i (isothermal subzone of the tropics) and tundra climate regions of S outh A merica using denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis. Bacterioplankton community composition ( BCC ) differed significantly across regions. Although a large fraction of the variation in BCC remained unexplained, the results supported a consistent significant contribution of local environmental variables and to a lesser extent spatial variables, irrespective of spatial scale. Upon correction for space, mainly biotic environmental factors significantly explained the variation in BCC . The abundance of pelagic cladocerans remained particularly significant, suggesting grazer effects on bacterioplankton communities in the studied lakes. These results confirm that bacterioplankton communities are predominantly structured by environmental factors, even over a large‐scale latitudinal gradient (6026 km), and stress the importance of including biotic variables in studies that aim to understand patterns in BCC .

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