The dynamic trophic architecture of open-ocean protist communities revealed through machine-guided metatranscriptomics.

ABSTRACT: Intricate networks of single-celled eukaryotes (protists) dominate carbon flow in the ocean. Their growth, demise, and interactions with other microorganisms drive the fluxes of biogeochemical elements through marine ecosystems. Mixotrophic protists are capable of both photosynthesis and ingestion of prey and are dominant components of open-ocean planktonic communities. Yet the role of mixotrophs in elemental cycling is obscured by their capacity to act as primary producers or heterotrophic consumers depending on factors that remain largely uncharacterized. Here, we develop and apply a machine learning model that predicts the in situ trophic mode of aquatic protists based on their patterns of gene expression. This approach leverages a public collection of protist transcriptomes as a traini

SUBMITTER: Lambert BS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8851463 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature