Project description:Salt marshes provide many key ecosystem services that have tremendous ecological and economic value. One critical service is the removal of fixed nitrogen from coastal waters, which limits the negative effects of eutrophication resulting from increased nutrient supply. Nutrient enrichment of salt marsh sediments results in higher rates of nitrogen cycling and, commonly, a concurrent increase in the flux of nitrous oxide, an important greenhouse gas. Little is known, however, regarding controls on the microbial communities that contribute to nitrous oxide fluxes in marsh sediments. To address this disconnect, we generated microbial community profiles as well as directly assayed nitrogen cycling genes that encode the enzymes responsible for overall nitrous oxide flux from salt marsh sediments. We hypothesized that communities of microbes responsible for nitrogen transformations will be structured by nitrogen availability. Taxa that respond positively to high nitrogen inputs may be responsible for the elevated rates of nitrogen cycling processes measured in fertilized sediments. Our data show that, with the exception of ammonia-oxidizing archaea, the community composition of organisms responsible for production and consumption of nitrous oxide was altered under nutrient enrichment. These results suggest that elevated rates of nitrous oxide production and consumption are the result of changes in community structure, not simply changes in microbial activity.
Project description:Ammonia-oxidizing archaeal (AOA) amoA diversity and relative abundance in Gulf of Mexico sediments (0-2 cm) were investigated using a functional gene microarray; a two color array with a universal internal standard
Project description:Ammonia-oxidizing archaeal (AOA) amoA diversity and relative abundance in Gulf of Mexico sediments (0-2 cm) were investigated using a functional gene microarray; a two color array with a universal internal standard Two color array (cy3 and cy5): the universal standard 20 bp oligo (fluoresced with cy5) is printed to the slide with a 70-mer. Environmental DNA sequences (fluoresced with Cy3) within 15% of the 70-mer will bind to it. Signal is the cy3/cy5. Up to four arrays per sample, with two biological replicates made into two targets, each run on duplicate arrays.
Project description:Functional redundancy in bacterial communities is expected to allow microbial assemblages to survive perturbation by allowing continuity in function despite compositional changes in communities. Recent evidence suggests, however, that microbial communities change both composition and function as a result of disturbance. We present evidence for a third response: resistance. We examined microbial community response to perturbation caused by nutrient enrichment in salt marsh sediments using deep pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA and functional gene microarrays targeting the nirS gene. Composition of the microbial community, as demonstrated by both genes, was unaffected by significant variations in external nutrient supply, despite demonstrable and diverse nutrient–induced changes in many aspects of marsh ecology. The lack of response to external forcing demonstrates a remarkable uncoupling between microbial composition and ecosystem-level biogeochemical processes and suggests that sediment microbial communities are able to resist some forms of perturbation. nirS gene diversity from two salt marsh experiments, GSM (4 treatments, 8 samples, duplicate arrays, four replicate blocks per array, 8 arrays per slide) and PIE (2 treatments, 16 samples, duplicate arrays four replicate blocks per array, 8 arrays per slide)
Project description:Time series metasecretomes (weeks 1, 3, 5 and ten) of lignocellulose responsive microbiomes enriching on Spartina anglica biomass for 16 weeks in a natural UK salt marsh (Welwick, Humber estuary).
Project description:Transcriptomic changes following recent natural hybridization and allopolyploidy in the salt marsh species Spartina x townsendii and Spartina anglica (Poaceae) Allopolyploidy results from two events: the merger of divergent genomes and genome duplication. Both events have important functional consequences for the evolution and adaption of newly formed allopolyploid species. In spite of significant progress made the last years, a few studies have decoupled the effects of hybridization from genome duplication in the observed patterns of expression changes accompanying allopolyploidy in natural conditions. We used Agilent Rice oligo-microarrays to explore gene expression changes following allopolyploidy in Spartina that includes a classical example of recent allopolyploid speciation, S. anglica formed during the 19th century following genome duplication of the hybrid S. x townsendii. Our data indicate important, thought different effects of hybridization and genome duplication in the expression patterns of the hybrid and allopolyploid. Deviation from parental additivity was most important following hybridization and was accompanied by maternal expression dominance, although transgressively expressed genes were also encountered. Maternal dominance is attenuated following genome duplication in S. anglica while this species exhibits an increased number of transgressively over expressed genes. These results reflect the decoupled effects of the “genomic shock” following hybridization and genome redundancy, on the genetic, epigenetic and regulatory mechanisms characterizing transcriptomic evolution in allopolyploids.