Project description:Regulatory small RNAs (sRNAs) represent a major class of regulatory molecules that play large-scale and essential roles in many cellular processes across all domains of life. Microbial sRNAs have been primarily investigated in a few model organisms and little is known about the dynamics of sRNA synthesis in natural environments, and the roles of these short transcripts at the community level. Analyzing the metatranscriptome of a model extremophilic community inhabiting halite nodules (salt rocks) from the Atacama Desert, sampled over two years with different weather conditions, with SnapT – a new sRNA annotation pipeline – we discovered hundreds of intergenic (itsRNAs) and antisense (asRNAs) sRNAs expressed.
Project description:Desert microbial communities live in a pulsed ecosystem shaped by isolated and rare precipitation events. The Namib desert is one of the oldest continuously hyperarid ecosystems on Earth. In this study, surface microbial communities of open soils (without sheltering features like rocks, vegetation or biological soil crusts) are analysed. We designed an artificial rainfall experiment where a 7x7 (3.5 x 3.5 m) plot remained dry while an adjacent one received a 30 mm simulated rain. Samples were taken randomly in parallel from both plots at 10 min, 1 h, 3 h, 7 h, 24 h and 7 days after the watering moment. Duplicate libraries were generated from total (rRNA depleted) RNA and sequenced 2x150 bp in an Illumina Hiseq 4000 instrument.
