Methanogens and Iron-Reducing Bacteria: the Overlooked Members of Mercury-Methylating Microbial Communities in Boreal Lakes.

ABSTRACT: Methylmercury is a potent human neurotoxin which biomagnifies in aquatic food webs. Although anaerobic microorganisms containing the hgcA gene potentially mediate the formation of methylmercury in natural environments, the diversity of these mercury-methylating microbial communities remains largely unexplored. Previous studies have implicated sulfate-reducing bacteria as the main mercury methylators in aquatic ecosystems. In the present study, we characterized the diversity of mercury-methylating microbial communities of boreal lake sediments using high-throughput sequencing of 16S rRNA and hgcA genes. Our results show that in the lake sediments, Methanomicrobiales and Geobacteraceae also represent abundant members of the mercury-methylating communities. In fact

SUBMITTER: Bravo AG 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6238055 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature