Metagenomic Analysis of Previously Understudied Lakes in the Vestfold Hills, East Antarctica
Antarctica, like most natural environments on Earth, contains microbes that dominate the gene pool and biomass of aquatic habitats such as – lakes, stratified marine basins, fjords, and the surrounding Southern Ocean. Within these habitats, the microbes form the basis of the food webs and take part...
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UNSW, Sydney
2021
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Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1959.4/70587 https://unsworks.unsw.edu.au/bitstreams/b4c0e682-e961-44e7-b44e-36258df5ad59/download https://doi.org/10.26190/unsworks/22310 |
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ftunswworks:oai:unsworks.library.unsw.edu.au:1959.4/70587 2023-05-15T13:48:45+02:00 Metagenomic Analysis of Previously Understudied Lakes in the Vestfold Hills, East Antarctica Haque, Sabrina 2021 application/pdf http://hdl.handle.net/1959.4/70587 https://unsworks.unsw.edu.au/bitstreams/b4c0e682-e961-44e7-b44e-36258df5ad59/download https://doi.org/10.26190/unsworks/22310 EN eng UNSW, Sydney http://hdl.handle.net/1959.4/70587 https://unsworks.unsw.edu.au/bitstreams/b4c0e682-e961-44e7-b44e-36258df5ad59/download https://doi.org/10.26190/unsworks/22310 open access https://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_abf2 CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/au/ free_to_read CC-BY-NC-ND Sterivex Metagenomics Biogeography Endemic Antarctica Haloarchaea master thesis http://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_bdcc 2021 ftunswworks https://doi.org/10.26190/unsworks/22310 2022-08-09T07:34:55Z Antarctica, like most natural environments on Earth, contains microbes that dominate the gene pool and biomass of aquatic habitats such as – lakes, stratified marine basins, fjords, and the surrounding Southern Ocean. Within these habitats, the microbes form the basis of the food webs and take part in biogeochemical cycling, thereby influencing global ecosystem function. Various ‘omic’ approaches have been developed to explore diversity of environmental microbial communities without the necessity for growing pure cultures in laboratories. One such approach, called metagenomics, applies shotgun DNA sequencing to millions of random genomic fragments, obtained from environmental samples, and utilizes the resulting sequence data for taxonomic and/or functional profiling purposes. Haloarchaea tend to dominate hypersaline lakes in the Vestfold Hills and the Rauer Islands of East Antarctica. This research aimed to study metagenomes from several hypersaline lakes located within the Vestfold Hills and the Rauer Islands to analyse the effects of two environmental parameters, salinity and distance, on the abundance of haloarchaea within the lakes, and to investigate haloarchaeal species endemicity. DNA was extracted from the biomass of 78 Antarctic lakes that was captured on sterivex filters, and the DNA was quantified using Qubit fluorometry. Metagenome data was obtained for 28 of the samples, together with metagenome data for 17 previously sequenced samples. The data were then analysed using computational tools including Kaiju v1.6.3 and Plymouth Routines In Multivariate Ecological Research v7. The analyses revealed that haloarchaea were the most abundant taxa within the hypersaline lakes with haloarchaeal diversity being highly influenced by lake salinity, rather than the proximity of the lakes to each other. The study further went on to provide stronger evidence that specific haloarchaeal species, Halohashta litchfieldiae, Halorubrum lacusprofundi and Halophilic archaeon DL31, were endemic to Antarctica. Master Thesis Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica East Antarctica Rauer Islands Southern Ocean UNSW Sydney (The University of New South Wales): UNSWorks Antarctic Southern Ocean East Antarctica Vestfold Hills Vestfold Rauer Islands ENVELOPE(77.833,77.833,-68.850,-68.850) |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
UNSW Sydney (The University of New South Wales): UNSWorks |
op_collection_id |
ftunswworks |
language |
English |
topic |
Sterivex Metagenomics Biogeography Endemic Antarctica Haloarchaea |
spellingShingle |
Sterivex Metagenomics Biogeography Endemic Antarctica Haloarchaea Haque, Sabrina Metagenomic Analysis of Previously Understudied Lakes in the Vestfold Hills, East Antarctica |
topic_facet |
Sterivex Metagenomics Biogeography Endemic Antarctica Haloarchaea |
description |
Antarctica, like most natural environments on Earth, contains microbes that dominate the gene pool and biomass of aquatic habitats such as – lakes, stratified marine basins, fjords, and the surrounding Southern Ocean. Within these habitats, the microbes form the basis of the food webs and take part in biogeochemical cycling, thereby influencing global ecosystem function. Various ‘omic’ approaches have been developed to explore diversity of environmental microbial communities without the necessity for growing pure cultures in laboratories. One such approach, called metagenomics, applies shotgun DNA sequencing to millions of random genomic fragments, obtained from environmental samples, and utilizes the resulting sequence data for taxonomic and/or functional profiling purposes. Haloarchaea tend to dominate hypersaline lakes in the Vestfold Hills and the Rauer Islands of East Antarctica. This research aimed to study metagenomes from several hypersaline lakes located within the Vestfold Hills and the Rauer Islands to analyse the effects of two environmental parameters, salinity and distance, on the abundance of haloarchaea within the lakes, and to investigate haloarchaeal species endemicity. DNA was extracted from the biomass of 78 Antarctic lakes that was captured on sterivex filters, and the DNA was quantified using Qubit fluorometry. Metagenome data was obtained for 28 of the samples, together with metagenome data for 17 previously sequenced samples. The data were then analysed using computational tools including Kaiju v1.6.3 and Plymouth Routines In Multivariate Ecological Research v7. The analyses revealed that haloarchaea were the most abundant taxa within the hypersaline lakes with haloarchaeal diversity being highly influenced by lake salinity, rather than the proximity of the lakes to each other. The study further went on to provide stronger evidence that specific haloarchaeal species, Halohashta litchfieldiae, Halorubrum lacusprofundi and Halophilic archaeon DL31, were endemic to Antarctica. |
format |
Master Thesis |
author |
Haque, Sabrina |
author_facet |
Haque, Sabrina |
author_sort |
Haque, Sabrina |
title |
Metagenomic Analysis of Previously Understudied Lakes in the Vestfold Hills, East Antarctica |
title_short |
Metagenomic Analysis of Previously Understudied Lakes in the Vestfold Hills, East Antarctica |
title_full |
Metagenomic Analysis of Previously Understudied Lakes in the Vestfold Hills, East Antarctica |
title_fullStr |
Metagenomic Analysis of Previously Understudied Lakes in the Vestfold Hills, East Antarctica |
title_full_unstemmed |
Metagenomic Analysis of Previously Understudied Lakes in the Vestfold Hills, East Antarctica |
title_sort |
metagenomic analysis of previously understudied lakes in the vestfold hills, east antarctica |
publisher |
UNSW, Sydney |
publishDate |
2021 |
url |
http://hdl.handle.net/1959.4/70587 https://unsworks.unsw.edu.au/bitstreams/b4c0e682-e961-44e7-b44e-36258df5ad59/download https://doi.org/10.26190/unsworks/22310 |
long_lat |
ENVELOPE(77.833,77.833,-68.850,-68.850) |
geographic |
Antarctic Southern Ocean East Antarctica Vestfold Hills Vestfold Rauer Islands |
geographic_facet |
Antarctic Southern Ocean East Antarctica Vestfold Hills Vestfold Rauer Islands |
genre |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica East Antarctica Rauer Islands Southern Ocean |
genre_facet |
Antarc* Antarctic Antarctica East Antarctica Rauer Islands Southern Ocean |
op_relation |
http://hdl.handle.net/1959.4/70587 https://unsworks.unsw.edu.au/bitstreams/b4c0e682-e961-44e7-b44e-36258df5ad59/download https://doi.org/10.26190/unsworks/22310 |
op_rights |
open access https://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_abf2 CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/au/ free_to_read |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY-NC-ND |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.26190/unsworks/22310 |
_version_ |
1766249662933630976 |