Aeolian dispersal of bacteria in southwest Greenland: Their sources, abundance, diversity and physiological states ...
The Arctic is undergoing dramatic climatic changes that cause profound transformations in its terrestrial ecosystems and consequently in the microbial communities that inhabit them. The assembly of these communities is affected by aeolian deposition. However, the abundance, diversity, sources and ac...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
ETH Zurich
2018
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://dx.doi.org/10.3929/ethz-b-000266148 http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/266148 |
| Summary: | The Arctic is undergoing dramatic climatic changes that cause profound transformations in its terrestrial ecosystems and consequently in the microbial communities that inhabit them. The assembly of these communities is affected by aeolian deposition. However, the abundance, diversity, sources and activity of airborne microorganisms in the Arctic are poorly understood. We studied bacteria in the atmosphere over southwest Greenland and found that the diversity of bacterial communities correlated positively with air temperature and negatively with relative humidity. The communities consisted of 1.3×10³ ± 1.0×10³ cells m⁻³, which were aerosolized from local terrestrial environments or transported from marine, glaciated and terrestrial surfaces over long distances. On average, airborne bacterial cells displayed a high activity potential, reflected in the high 16S rRNA copy number (590 ± 300 rRNA cell⁻¹), that correlated positively with water vapor pressure. We observed that bacterial clades differed in their ... : FEMS Microbiology Ecology, 94 (4) ... |
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