Characterization of the microbial mats surrounding geothermal environments by culturing and 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing methods.
Supervisor: Jesús M. Arrieta (IEO, Canarias)
Now is an exciting time to work in the field of microbial ecology. Advances in bioinformatic analysis have made it easier than ever to process metagenomic data taken from the environment. In fact, candidatus species can be described based on metagenomics data alone. Further, microbes play a pivotal role in biogeochemical processes that govern the planet. This project seeks to elucidate on the presence of microbial communities in geothermal environments and they play in these ecosystems. The samples from which this analysis was conducted come from two locations, a shallow hydrothermal vent system off a submarine volcano in the Canary Islands and a hydrocarbon seep located in the Red Sea. These environments constitute two of the key geothermal ecosystems that can be observed in the global ocean. At both, large microbial mats serve as the base of the ecosystem with chemolithoautotrophs that through redox reactions utilize the geochemical species being released from the geothermal site. At cold seeps methane percolates through the marine sediment where methanogenic prokaryotes anaerobically oxidize this methane. This process not only benefits the surrounding microbial community by providing an electron donor as the product of the reaction but serves as a control to one of the most potent green-house gases on the planet. This project pertains to not only understanding the microbial community ecology of these environments, but also expanding on existing knowledge of new species. At Tagoro, the submarine volcano, a filamentous bacterial mat was discovered that, through metagenomic analysis, proved capable of an impressive number of different metabolic pathways, named Venus’s Hair based off its morphological characteristics. However, the genome for this candidatus species was only partially completed. In addition to understanding the community makeup and function of this ecosystem this project sought to isolate this candidatus species and sequence its entire genome to provide a basis of comparison to the initial publication on the species. This project presents a replicable methodology to collect environmental data, process it and conduct community ecological analysis to determine the presence of prokaryotic communities at these sites.