Effects of reciprocal transplantation on the microbiome and putative nitrogen cycling functions of the intertidal sponge, Hymeniacidon heliophila

Microbial symbionts in sponges are ubiquitous, forming complex and highly diverse host-specific communities. Conspecific sponges display remarkable stability in their symbiont communities, both spatially and temporally, yet extreme fluctuations in environmental factors can cause shifts in host-symbiont associations. We previously demonstrated that the marine sponge Hymeniacidon heliophila displayed significant community-level differences in microbial symbiont diversity, structure and composition when sampled from intertidal and subtidal environments. Here, we conducted a 70-day reciprocal transplant experiment to directly test the effect of tidal exposure on the microbiome of H. heliophila, using next-generation Illumina sequencing of 16S rRNA gene sequences to characterize symbiont communities. While sponges transplanted between habitats displayed shifts in microbial communities after 70 days, temporal variation was the dominant factor affecting microbial community composition. Further, we identified core symbionts that persisted across these spatio-temporal scales and used a metagenomic approach to show that these dominant members of the microbiome of H. heliophila represent nitrogen cycling taxa that have the potential to contribute to a diverse array of nitrogen transformations in the sponge holobiont. Together, these results indicate that despite moderate spatio-temporal shifts in symbiont composition, core symbiont functions (e.g. nitrogen cycling) can be maintained in sponge microbiomes through functional redundancy.