Microbial Community Structure Driven by a Volcanic Gradient in Glaciers of the Antarctic Archipelago South Shetland.

ABSTRACT: It has been demonstrated that the englacial ecosystem in volcanic environments is inhabited by active bacteria. To know whether this result could be extrapolated to other Antarctic glaciers and to study the populations of microeukaryotes in addition to those of bacteria, a study was performed using ice samples from eight glaciers in the South Shetland archipelago. The identification of microbial communities of bacteria and microeukaryotes using 16S rRNA and 18S rRNA high throughput sequencing showed a great diversity when compared with microbiomes of other Antarctic glaciers or frozen deserts. Even the composition of the microbial communities identified in the glaciers from the same island was different, which may be due to the isolation of microbial clusters within the ice. A gradient in

SUBMITTER: Garcia-Lopez E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7917679 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature