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Uncovered Microbial Diversity in Antarctic Cryptoendolithic Communities Sampling Three Representative Locations of the Victoria Land

The endolithic niche represents an ultimate refuge to microorganisms in the Mars-like environment of the Antarctic desert. In an era of rapid global change and desertification, the interest in these border ecosystems is increasing due to speculation on how they maintain balance and functionality at...

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Autores principales: Coleine, Claudia, Pombubpa, Nuttapon, Zucconi, Laura, Onofri, Silvano, Turchetti, Benedetta, Buzzini, Pietro, Stajich, Jason E., Selbmann, Laura
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7356261/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32585947
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/microorganisms8060942
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author Coleine, Claudia
Pombubpa, Nuttapon
Zucconi, Laura
Onofri, Silvano
Turchetti, Benedetta
Buzzini, Pietro
Stajich, Jason E.
Selbmann, Laura
author_facet Coleine, Claudia
Pombubpa, Nuttapon
Zucconi, Laura
Onofri, Silvano
Turchetti, Benedetta
Buzzini, Pietro
Stajich, Jason E.
Selbmann, Laura
author_sort Coleine, Claudia
collection PubMed
description The endolithic niche represents an ultimate refuge to microorganisms in the Mars-like environment of the Antarctic desert. In an era of rapid global change and desertification, the interest in these border ecosystems is increasing due to speculation on how they maintain balance and functionality at the dry limits of life. To assure a reliable estimation of microbial diversity, proper sampling must be planned in order to avoid the necessity of re-sampling as reaching these remote locations is risky and requires tremendous logistical and economical efforts. In this study, we seek to determine the minimum number of samples for uncovering comprehensive bacterial and fungal diversity, comparing communities in strict vicinity to each other. We selected three different locations of the Victoria Land (Continental Antarctica) at different altitudes and showing sandstone outcrops of a diverse nature and origin—Battleship promontory (834 m above sea level (a.s.l.), Southern VL), Trio Nunatak (1,470 m a.s.l., Northern VL) and Mt New Zealand (3,100 m a.s.l., Northern VL). Overall, we found that a wider sampling would be required to capture the whole amplitude of microbial diversity, particularly in Northern VL. We concluded that the inhomogeneity of the rock matrix and the stronger environmental pressure at higher altitudes may force the communities to a higher local diversification.
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spelling pubmed-73562612020-07-31 Uncovered Microbial Diversity in Antarctic Cryptoendolithic Communities Sampling Three Representative Locations of the Victoria Land Coleine, Claudia Pombubpa, Nuttapon Zucconi, Laura Onofri, Silvano Turchetti, Benedetta Buzzini, Pietro Stajich, Jason E. Selbmann, Laura Microorganisms Article The endolithic niche represents an ultimate refuge to microorganisms in the Mars-like environment of the Antarctic desert. In an era of rapid global change and desertification, the interest in these border ecosystems is increasing due to speculation on how they maintain balance and functionality at the dry limits of life. To assure a reliable estimation of microbial diversity, proper sampling must be planned in order to avoid the necessity of re-sampling as reaching these remote locations is risky and requires tremendous logistical and economical efforts. In this study, we seek to determine the minimum number of samples for uncovering comprehensive bacterial and fungal diversity, comparing communities in strict vicinity to each other. We selected three different locations of the Victoria Land (Continental Antarctica) at different altitudes and showing sandstone outcrops of a diverse nature and origin—Battleship promontory (834 m above sea level (a.s.l.), Southern VL), Trio Nunatak (1,470 m a.s.l., Northern VL) and Mt New Zealand (3,100 m a.s.l., Northern VL). Overall, we found that a wider sampling would be required to capture the whole amplitude of microbial diversity, particularly in Northern VL. We concluded that the inhomogeneity of the rock matrix and the stronger environmental pressure at higher altitudes may force the communities to a higher local diversification. MDPI 2020-06-23 /pmc/articles/PMC7356261/ /pubmed/32585947 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/microorganisms8060942 Text en © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Coleine, Claudia
Pombubpa, Nuttapon
Zucconi, Laura
Onofri, Silvano
Turchetti, Benedetta
Buzzini, Pietro
Stajich, Jason E.
Selbmann, Laura
Uncovered Microbial Diversity in Antarctic Cryptoendolithic Communities Sampling Three Representative Locations of the Victoria Land
title Uncovered Microbial Diversity in Antarctic Cryptoendolithic Communities Sampling Three Representative Locations of the Victoria Land
title_full Uncovered Microbial Diversity in Antarctic Cryptoendolithic Communities Sampling Three Representative Locations of the Victoria Land
title_fullStr Uncovered Microbial Diversity in Antarctic Cryptoendolithic Communities Sampling Three Representative Locations of the Victoria Land
title_full_unstemmed Uncovered Microbial Diversity in Antarctic Cryptoendolithic Communities Sampling Three Representative Locations of the Victoria Land
title_short Uncovered Microbial Diversity in Antarctic Cryptoendolithic Communities Sampling Three Representative Locations of the Victoria Land
title_sort uncovered microbial diversity in antarctic cryptoendolithic communities sampling three representative locations of the victoria land
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7356261/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32585947
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/microorganisms8060942
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