Functional Seasonality of Free-Living and Particle-Associated Prokaryotic Communities in the Coastal Adriatic Sea.

ABSTRACT: Marine snow is an important habitat for microbes, characterized by chemical and physical properties contrasting those of the ambient water. The higher nutrient concentrations in marine snow lead to compositional differences between the ambient water and the marine snow-associated prokaryotic community. Whether these compositional differences vary due to seasonal environmental changes, however, remains unclear. Thus, we investigated the seasonal patterns of the free-living and marine snow-associated microbial community composition and their functional potential in the northern Adriatic Sea. Our data revealed seasonal patterns in both, the free-living and marine snow-associated prokaryotes. The two assemblages were more similar to each other in spring and fall than in winter and summer. The

SUBMITTER: Steiner PA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7701263 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature