Dataset Information

Filamentous phages prevalent in Pseudoalteromonas spp. confer properties advantageous to host survival in Arctic sea ice.

ABSTRACT: Sea ice is one of the most frigid environments for marine microbes. In contrast to other ocean ecosystems, microbes in permanent sea ice are space confined and subject to many extreme conditions, which change on a seasonal basis. How these microbial communities are regulated to survive the extreme sea ice environment is largely unknown. Here, we show that filamentous phages regulate the host bacterial community to improve survival of the host in permanent Arctic sea ice. We isolated a filamentous phage, f327, from an Arctic sea ice Pseudoalteromonas strain, and we demonstrated that this type of phage is widely distributed in Arctic sea ice. Growth experiments and transcriptome analysis indicated that this phage decreases the host growth rate, cell density and tolerance to NaCl and H2O2, but enhances its motility and chemotaxis. Our results suggest that the presence of the filamentous phage may be beneficial for survival of the host community in sea ice in winter, which is characterized by polar night, nutrient deficiency and high salinity, and that the filamentous phage may help avoid over blooming of the host in sea ice in summer, which is characterized by polar day, rich nutrient availability, intense radiation and high concentration of H2O2. Thus, while they cannot kill the host cells by lysing them, filamentous phages confer properties advantageous to host survival in the Arctic sea ice environment. Our study provides a foremost insight into the ecological role of filamentous phages in the Arctic sea ice ecosystem.

SUBMITTER: Yu ZC

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4817708 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Filamentous phages prevalent in Pseudoalteromonas spp. confer properties advantageous to host survival in Arctic sea ice.

Yu Zi-Chao ZC Chen Xiu-Lan XL Shen Qing-Tao QT Zhao Dian-Li DL Tang Bai-Lu BL Su Hai-Nan HN Wu Zhao-Yu ZY Qin Qi-Long QL Xie Bin-Bin BB Zhang Xi-Ying XY Yu Yong Y Zhou Bai-Cheng BC Chen Bo B Zhang Yu-Zhong YZ

The ISME journal 20150317 4

Sea ice is one of the most frigid environments for marine microbes. In contrast to other ocean ecosystems, microbes in permanent sea ice are space confined and subject to many extreme conditions, which change on a seasonal basis. How these microbial communities are regulated to survive the extreme sea ice environment is largely unknown. Here, we show that filamentous phages regulate the host bacterial community to improve survival of the host in permanent Arctic sea ice. We isolated a filamentou ...[more]

PMID: 25303713

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Project description:Arctic regions, which are changing rapidly as they warm 2 to 3 times faster than the global average, still retain microbial habitats that serve as natural laboratories for understanding mechanisms of microbial adaptation to extreme conditions. Seawater-derived brines within both sea ice (sea-ice brine) and ancient layers of permafrost (cryopeg brine) support diverse microbes adapted to subzero temperatures and high salinities, yet little is known about viruses in these extreme environments, which, if analogous to other systems, could play important evolutionary and ecosystem roles. Here, we characterized viral communities and their functions in samples of cryopeg brine, sea-ice brine, and melted sea ice. Viral abundance was high in cryopeg brine (1.2?×?108?ml-1) and much lower in sea-ice brine (1.3?×?105 to 2.1?×?105?ml-1), which roughly paralleled the differences in cell concentrations in these samples. Five low-input, quantitative viral metagenomes were sequenced to yield 476 viral populations (i.e., species level; ?10?kb), only 12% of which could be assigned taxonomy by traditional database approaches, indicating a high degree of novelty. Additional analyses revealed that these viruses: (i) formed communities that differed between sample type and vertically with sea-ice depth; (ii) infected hosts that dominated these extreme ecosystems, including Marinobacter, Glaciecola, and Colwellia; and (iii) encoded fatty acid desaturase (FAD) genes that likely helped their hosts overcome cold and salt stress during infection, as well as mediated horizontal gene transfer of FAD genes between microbes. Together, these findings contribute to understanding viral abundances and communities and how viruses impact their microbial hosts in subzero brines and sea ice.IMPORTANCE This study explores viral community structure and function in remote and extreme Arctic environments, including subzero brines within marine layers of permafrost and sea ice, using a modern viral ecogenomics toolkit for the first time. In addition to providing foundational data sets for these climate-threatened habitats, we found evidence that the viruses had habitat specificity, infected dominant microbial hosts, encoded host-derived metabolic genes, and mediated horizontal gene transfer among hosts. These results advance our understanding of the virosphere and how viruses influence extreme ecosystems. More broadly, the evidence that virally mediated gene transfers may be limited by host range in these extreme habitats contributes to a mechanistic understanding of genetic exchange among microbes under stressful conditions in other systems.

Dataset Information

Filamentous phages prevalent in Pseudoalteromonas spp. confer properties advantageous to host survival in Arctic sea ice.

Publications

Filamentous phages prevalent in Pseudoalteromonas spp. confer properties advantageous to host survival in Arctic sea ice.

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