New viral biogeochemical roles revealed through metagenomic analysis of Lake Baikal.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Lake Baikal is the largest body of liquid freshwater on Earth. Previous studies have described the microbial composition of this habitat, but the viral communities from this ecosystem have not been characterized in detail.

Results

Here, we describe the viral diversity of this habitat across depth and seasonal gradients. We discovered 19,475 bona fide viral sequences, which are derived from viruses predicted to infect abundant and ecologically important taxa that reside in Lake Baikal, such as Nitrospirota, Methylophilaceae, and Crenarchaeota. Diversity analysis revealed significant changes in viral community composition between epipelagic and bathypelagic zones. Analysis of the gene content of individual viral populations allowed us to describe one of the first ba

SUBMITTER: Coutinho FH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7678222 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature