Project description:Deep Lake is a hypersaline system in Antarctica (68°33’36.8S, 78°11’48.7E) that is so saline it remains liquid at –20°C (DeMaere et al 2013). The lake is dominated by haloarchaea, comprising a low-complexity community that differs greatly to warm-hot latitude hypersaline systems, is hierarchical structured, and supports a high level of intergenera gene exchange. Metaproteomics was performed on biomass that was collected in the austral summer of 2008 by sequential size fractionation (20 – 3 µm, 3 – 0.8 µm, 0.8 – 0.1 µm). The data were integrated to obtain a systems level view of the active host-virus interactions occurring in this novel aquatic Antarctic system. DeMaere MZ, Williams TJ, Allen MA, Brown MV, Gibson JA, Rich J, Lauro FM, Dyall-Smith M, Davenport KW, Woyke T, Kyrpides NC, Tringe SG, Cavicchioli R (2013) High level of intergenera gene exchange shapes the evolution of haloarchaea in an isolated Antarctic lake. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 110: 16939-16944
Project description:Protein stable isotope fingerprinting (P-SIF) is a method to measure the carbon isotope ratios of whole proteins separated from complex mixtures, including cultures and environmental samples. The goal of P-SIF is to expose the links between identity and function in microbial ecosystems by (i) determining the values of δ13C for different taxonomic divisions, and (ii) using those values as clues to the metabolic pathways employed by the respective organisms. This project measures a limited number of protein fractions and δ13C values for a sample of floating, mat-like microbial biomass of an intensely phototrophic layer from Mahoney Lake, BC Canada.
