Project description:we characterized the microbial communities and proteomes of POC collected from the twilight zone at three contrasting sites in the northwest Pacific Ocean using a metaproteomic approach.Particle-attached bacteria, Alteromonadales, Rhodobacterales and Enterobacteriales, were the major remineralizers of POC in the twilight zone.
Project description:Transcriptional profiling of populations in the clam Ruditapes decussatus determined differentiation in gene-expression along parallel temperature gradients and between races of the Atlantic Ocean and West Mediterranean sea.
Project description:Ocean acidification, resulting from the dissolution of excess CO2 produced by humans into the ocean, is predicted to impact a broad variety of marine taxa, particularly calcifying animals such as the thecosome (shelled) pteropods. To achieve a better understanding of the mechanisms of pteropod calcification and physiological compensation for high CO2 exposure, we investigated the transcriptomic responses of Clio pyramidata, a cosmopolitan diel migratory thecosome. Individuals were sampled from the Northwest Atlantic in the fall of 2011 and were exposed to ambient (~380 ppm) and end of the century predicted CO2 levels (~800 ppm) and their oxygen consumption was measured. We then used RNA-seq technology to assess transcriptome-wide effects of exposure to elevated CO2. We conducted a de novo assembly of the transcriptome of C. pyramidata, annotated the genes associated with biomineralization, and assessed the differential gene expression patterns. This assembly reveals a number of similarities with other molluscan transcriptomes, and some similar biomineralization genes such as perlucin, calmodulin, regucalcin and SPARC. The results of the differential expression indicate that there is a great deal of natural variability in gene expression and suggest that a few genes putatively associated with biomineralization, particularly perlucin, were up-regulated in the high CO2 treatment. This is the first experiment employing gene expression analysis to investigate the effects of CO2 on a planktonic open-ocean species, providing the first insights into the effects of acidification on these important planktonic calcifiers and suggesting interesting gene families which may prove useful in further ecophysiological, biomaterials and phylogenetic studies.
Project description:This project presents field metaproteomics data from Trichodesmium colonies collected from the surface ocean. Most were collected from the tropical and subtropical Atlantic ocean, but there is also data from the long term Bermuda Atlantic Time Series and Hawaii Ocean Time Series. Trichodesmium is a globally important marine microbe and its growth and nitrogen fixation activity is limited by nutrient availability in the surface ocean. This dataset was generated to answer questions about limitations on Trichodesmium's growth and activity in the nature.
Project description:Seamounts, often rising hundreds of metres above the surrounding seafloor, obstruct the flow of deep-ocean water. While the resultant entrainment of deep-water by seamounts is predicted from ocean circulation models, its empirical validation has been hampered by the large scale and slow rate of the interaction. To overcome these limitations we use the growth of planktonic bacteria to assess the interaction rate. The selected study site, Tropic Seamount, in the North-Eastern Atlantic represents the majority of isolated seamounts, which do not affect the surface ocean waters. We prove deep-water is entrained by the seamount by measuring 2.3 times higher bacterial concentrations in the seamount-associated or ‘sheath’ water than in deep-ocean water unaffected by seamounts. Genomic analyses of the dominant sheath-water bacteria confirm their planktonic origin, whilst proteomic analyses indicate their slow growth. According to our radiotracer experiments, the doubling time of sheath-water bacterioplankton is 1.5 years. Therefore, for bacterioplankton concentration to reach 2.3 times higher in the ambient seawater, the seamount would need to retain deep-ocean water for more than 3.5 years. We propose that turbulent mixing of the retained sheath-water could stimulate bacterioplankton growth by increasing the cell encounter rate with the ambient dissolved organic molecules. If some of these molecules chelate hydroxides of iron and manganese, bacterioplankton consumption of the organic chelators would result in precipitation of insoluble hydroxides. Hence precipitated hydroxides would form ferromanganese deposits as a result of the bacterioplankton-mediated deep-water seamount interaction.
Project description:Erythrobacter species are extensively studied marine bacteria that produce various carotenoids. Due to their photoheterotrophic ability, it has been suggested that they play a crucial role in marine ecosystems. It is essential to identify the genome sequence and the genes of the species to predict their role in the marine ecosystem. In this study, we report the complete genome sequence of the marine bacterium Erythrobacter sp. 3-20A1M. The genome size was 3.1 Mbp and its GC content was 64.8%. In total, 2998 genetic features were annotated, of which 2882 were annotated as functional coding genes. Using the genetic information of Erythrobacter sp. 3-20A1M, we performed pangenome analysis with other Erythrobacter species. This revealed highly conserved secondary metabolite biosynthesis-related COG functions across Erythrobacter species. Through subsequent secondary metabolite biosynthetic gene cluster prediction and KEGG analysis, the carotenoid biosynthetic pathway was proven conserved in all Erythrobacter species, except for the spheroidene and spirilloxanthin pathways, which are only found in photosynthetic Erythrobacter species. The presence of virulence genes, especially the plant-algae cell wall degrading genes, revealed that Erythrobacter sp. 3-20A1M is a potential marine plant-algae scavenger.