Eukaryotic and cyanobacterial communities associated with marine snow particles in the oligotrophic Sargasso Sea.

ABSTRACT: Marine snow aggregates represent heterogeneous agglomerates of dead and living organic matter. Composition is decisive for their sinking rates, and thereby for carbon flux to the deep sea. For oligotrophic oceans, information on aggregate composition is particularly sparse. To address this, the taxonomic composition of aggregates collected from the subtropical and oligotrophic Sargasso Sea (Atlantic Ocean) was characterized by 16S and 18S rRNA gene sequencing. Taxonomy assignment was aided by a collection of the contemporary plankton community consisting of 75 morphologically and genetically identified plankton specimens. The diverse rRNA gene reads of marine snow aggregates, not considering Trichodesmium puffs, were dominated by copepods (52%), cnidarians (21%), radiolarians (11%), and al

SUBMITTER: Lundgreen RBC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6586830 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature