Microbial Diversity in a Hypersaline Sulfate Lake: A Terrestrial Analog of Ancient Mars
Life can persist under severe osmotic stress and low water activity in hypersaline environments. On Mars, evidence for the past presence of saline bodies of water is prevalent and resulted in the widespread deposition of sulfate and chloride salts. Here we investigate Spotted Lake (British Columbia,...
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:5623196 2023-05-15T13:50:46+02:00 Microbial Diversity in a Hypersaline Sulfate Lake: A Terrestrial Analog of Ancient Mars Pontefract, Alexandra Zhu, Ting F. Walker, Virginia K. Hepburn, Holli Lui, Clarissa Zuber, Maria T. Ruvkun, Gary Carr, Christopher E. 2017-09-26 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5623196/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29018418 https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2017.01819 en eng Frontiers Media S.A. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5623196/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29018418 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2017.01819 Copyright © 2017 Pontefract, Zhu, Walker, Hepburn, Lui, Zuber, Ruvkun and Carr. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. CC-BY Microbiology Text 2017 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2017.01819 2017-10-15T00:09:25Z Life can persist under severe osmotic stress and low water activity in hypersaline environments. On Mars, evidence for the past presence of saline bodies of water is prevalent and resulted in the widespread deposition of sulfate and chloride salts. Here we investigate Spotted Lake (British Columbia, Canada), a hypersaline lake with extreme (>3 M) levels of sulfate salts as an exemplar of the conditions thought to be associated with ancient Mars. We provide the first characterization of microbial structure in Spotted Lake sediments through metagenomic sequencing, and report a bacteria-dominated community with abundant Proteobacteria, Firmicutes, and Bacteroidetes, as well as diverse extremophiles. Microbial abundance and functional comparisons reveal similarities to Ace Lake, a meromictic Antarctic lake with anoxic and sulfidic bottom waters. Our analysis suggests that hypersaline-associated species occupy niches characterized foremost by differential abundance of Archaea, uncharacterized Bacteria, and Cyanobacteria. Potential biosignatures in this environment are discussed, specifically the likelihood of a strong sulfur isotopic fractionation record within the sediments due to the presence of sulfate reducing bacteria. With its high sulfate levels and seasonal freeze-thaw cycles, Spotted Lake is an analog for ancient paleolakes on Mars in which sulfate salt deposits may have offered periodically habitable environments, and could have concentrated and preserved organic materials or their biomarkers over geologic time. Text Antarc* Antarctic PubMed Central (PMC) Ace Lake ENVELOPE(78.188,78.188,-68.472,-68.472) Antarctic British Columbia ENVELOPE(-125.003,-125.003,54.000,54.000) Canada Frontiers in Microbiology 8 |
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Microbiology |
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Microbiology Pontefract, Alexandra Zhu, Ting F. Walker, Virginia K. Hepburn, Holli Lui, Clarissa Zuber, Maria T. Ruvkun, Gary Carr, Christopher E. Microbial Diversity in a Hypersaline Sulfate Lake: A Terrestrial Analog of Ancient Mars |
topic_facet |
Microbiology |
description |
Life can persist under severe osmotic stress and low water activity in hypersaline environments. On Mars, evidence for the past presence of saline bodies of water is prevalent and resulted in the widespread deposition of sulfate and chloride salts. Here we investigate Spotted Lake (British Columbia, Canada), a hypersaline lake with extreme (>3 M) levels of sulfate salts as an exemplar of the conditions thought to be associated with ancient Mars. We provide the first characterization of microbial structure in Spotted Lake sediments through metagenomic sequencing, and report a bacteria-dominated community with abundant Proteobacteria, Firmicutes, and Bacteroidetes, as well as diverse extremophiles. Microbial abundance and functional comparisons reveal similarities to Ace Lake, a meromictic Antarctic lake with anoxic and sulfidic bottom waters. Our analysis suggests that hypersaline-associated species occupy niches characterized foremost by differential abundance of Archaea, uncharacterized Bacteria, and Cyanobacteria. Potential biosignatures in this environment are discussed, specifically the likelihood of a strong sulfur isotopic fractionation record within the sediments due to the presence of sulfate reducing bacteria. With its high sulfate levels and seasonal freeze-thaw cycles, Spotted Lake is an analog for ancient paleolakes on Mars in which sulfate salt deposits may have offered periodically habitable environments, and could have concentrated and preserved organic materials or their biomarkers over geologic time. |
format |
Text |
author |
Pontefract, Alexandra Zhu, Ting F. Walker, Virginia K. Hepburn, Holli Lui, Clarissa Zuber, Maria T. Ruvkun, Gary Carr, Christopher E. |
author_facet |
Pontefract, Alexandra Zhu, Ting F. Walker, Virginia K. Hepburn, Holli Lui, Clarissa Zuber, Maria T. Ruvkun, Gary Carr, Christopher E. |
author_sort |
Pontefract, Alexandra |
title |
Microbial Diversity in a Hypersaline Sulfate Lake: A Terrestrial Analog of Ancient Mars |
title_short |
Microbial Diversity in a Hypersaline Sulfate Lake: A Terrestrial Analog of Ancient Mars |
title_full |
Microbial Diversity in a Hypersaline Sulfate Lake: A Terrestrial Analog of Ancient Mars |
title_fullStr |
Microbial Diversity in a Hypersaline Sulfate Lake: A Terrestrial Analog of Ancient Mars |
title_full_unstemmed |
Microbial Diversity in a Hypersaline Sulfate Lake: A Terrestrial Analog of Ancient Mars |
title_sort |
microbial diversity in a hypersaline sulfate lake: a terrestrial analog of ancient mars |
publisher |
Frontiers Media S.A. |
publishDate |
2017 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5623196/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29018418 https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2017.01819 |
long_lat |
ENVELOPE(78.188,78.188,-68.472,-68.472) ENVELOPE(-125.003,-125.003,54.000,54.000) |
geographic |
Ace Lake Antarctic British Columbia Canada |
geographic_facet |
Ace Lake Antarctic British Columbia Canada |
genre |
Antarc* Antarctic |
genre_facet |
Antarc* Antarctic |
op_relation |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5623196/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29018418 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2017.01819 |
op_rights |
Copyright © 2017 Pontefract, Zhu, Walker, Hepburn, Lui, Zuber, Ruvkun and Carr. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2017.01819 |
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Frontiers in Microbiology |
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8 |
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1766254002410881024 |