Seagrass biofilm communities at a naturally CO 2 ‐rich vent

• Published in: Environmental Microbiology Reports
• Main Authors: Hassenrück, Christiane, Hofmann, Laurie C., Bischof, Kai, Ramette, Alban
• Other Authors: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung, Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, University of Bremen, Germany
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Wiley 2015
• Subjects: Ocean acidification
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1758-2229.12282; https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1111%2F1758-2229.12282; https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/1758-2229.12282; https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full-xml/10.1111/1758-2229.12282; http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/wol1/doi/10.1111/1758-2229.12282/fullpdf

Summary Seagrass meadows are a crucial component of tropical marine reef ecosystems. Seagrass plants are colonized by a multitude of epiphytic organisms that contribute to broadening the ecological role of seagrasses. To better understand how environmental changes like ocean acidification might affect epiphytic assemblages, the microbial community composition of the epiphytic biofilm of E nhalus acroides was investigated at a natural CO 2 vent in P apua N ew G uinea using molecular fingerprinting and next‐generation sequencing of 16 S and 18S rRNA genes. Both bacterial and eukaryotic epiphytes formed distinct communities at the CO 2 ‐impacted site compared with the control site. This site‐related CO 2 effect was also visible in the succession pattern of microbial epiphytes. We further found an increased relative sequence abundance of bacterial types associated with coral diseases at the CO 2 ‐impacted site ( F usobacteria , T halassomonas ), whereas eukaryotes such as certain crustose coralline algae commonly related to healthy reefs were less diverse. These trends in the epiphytic community of E . acroides suggest a potential role of seagrasses as vectors of coral pathogens and may support previous predictions of a decrease in reef health and prevalence of diseases under future ocean acidification scenarios.