Seagrass Colonization Alters Diversity, Abundance, Taxonomic, and Functional Community Structure of Benthic Microbial Eukaryotes.

ABSTRACT: Seagrass form high productive ecosystems in coastal environments. However, the effects of these coastal plants on the structure and function of the belowground eukaryotic microbiome remain elusive. In this study, we characterized the community of microbial eukaryotes (microeukaryotes) in both vegetated and unvegetated sediments using 18S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing and quantitative PCR. Analysis of sequencing data showed that the eelgrass (Zostera marina) colonization decreased the alpha diversity indices of benthic microeukaryotes. Apicomplexa represented an average of 83% of reads across all samples, with a higher proportion at the vegetated sites. The taxonomic community structure was significantly different between these two types of sediments, for which the concentration of

SUBMITTER: Pan Y 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9234489 | biostudies-literature | 2022

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature