Benthic Bacterial Community Composition in the Oligohaline-Marine Transition of Surface Sediments in the Baltic Sea Based on rRNA Analysis.

ABSTRACT: Salinity has a strong impact on bacterial community composition such that freshwater bacterial communities are very different from those in seawater. By contrast, little is known about the composition and diversity of the bacterial community in the sediments (bacteriobenthos) at the freshwater-seawater transition (mesohaline conditions). In this study, partial 16S-rRNA sequences were used to investigate the bacterial community at five stations, representing almost freshwater (oligohaline) to marine conditions, in the Baltic Sea. Samples were obtained from the silty, top-layer (0-2.5 cm) sediments with mostly oxygenated conditions. The long water residence time characteristic of the Baltic Sea, was predicted to enable the development of autochthonous bacteriobenthos at mesohaline conditions

SUBMITTER: Klier J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5827536 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature