Climate mediates continental scale patterns of stream microbial functional diversity.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Understanding the large-scale patterns of microbial functional diversity is essential for anticipating climate change impacts on ecosystems worldwide. However, studies of functional biogeography remain scarce for microorganisms, especially in freshwater ecosystems. Here we study 15,289 functional genes of stream biofilm microbes along three elevational gradients in Norway, Spain and China.

Results

We find that alpha diversity declines towards high elevations and assemblage composition shows increasing turnover with greater elevational distances. These elevational patterns are highly consistent across mountains, kingdoms and functional categories and exhibit the strongest trends in China due to its largest environmental gradients. Across mountains, functional gene

SUBMITTER: Picazo F 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7293791 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature