Project Details
Description
1)Lake O has areas that are more prone to developing cyanobacterial blooms. Importantly, areas where Lake O receives water show higher chlorophyll-a amounts (as a measure for cyanobacterial mass), indicating that these areas are prone to blooms. These may represent ‘bell weather’ sites that predict the onset of a larger bloom.
2)Metagenomic analysis has revealed changes in the abundance of different microbial and phage taxa in the lake during a bloom. Chief and most striking among these changes are changes in the number of picocyanobacteria, Microcystis, Dolichospermum, Pseudanabaena, and phages. We found that the increase in phage co-occurred with an increase in bloom-forming cyanobacteria that was concomitant with a decrease in the abundance of picocyanobacteria. We hypothesize that, owing to a lack of phage defense systems, phage can attack picocyanobacteria, allowing functional space for bloom formers to increase in their density. Importantly our work found that bloom formers, such as Microcystis, have diverse phage defense systems and are thus well protected against phage. It is possible that monitoring the amount of picocyanobacteria and/or phage using metagenomics, may serve as an early warning system for a bloom; a reduction in picocyanobacteria may indicate conditions favorable to bloom formation. More work needs to be done to test this hypothesis.
3) In mesocosms initiated from areas undergoing a minor bloom, we found that urea, but not ammonia or phosphate, increased the severity and longevity of a bloom. This suggests that limiting urea and urea-containing compounds, or more generally nitrogen, inflows into the lake could reduce bloom severity and longevity.
Data can be found at NCBI BioProject PRJNA813570.
2)Metagenomic analysis has revealed changes in the abundance of different microbial and phage taxa in the lake during a bloom. Chief and most striking among these changes are changes in the number of picocyanobacteria, Microcystis, Dolichospermum, Pseudanabaena, and phages. We found that the increase in phage co-occurred with an increase in bloom-forming cyanobacteria that was concomitant with a decrease in the abundance of picocyanobacteria. We hypothesize that, owing to a lack of phage defense systems, phage can attack picocyanobacteria, allowing functional space for bloom formers to increase in their density. Importantly our work found that bloom formers, such as Microcystis, have diverse phage defense systems and are thus well protected against phage. It is possible that monitoring the amount of picocyanobacteria and/or phage using metagenomics, may serve as an early warning system for a bloom; a reduction in picocyanobacteria may indicate conditions favorable to bloom formation. More work needs to be done to test this hypothesis.
3) In mesocosms initiated from areas undergoing a minor bloom, we found that urea, but not ammonia or phosphate, increased the severity and longevity of a bloom. This suggests that limiting urea and urea-containing compounds, or more generally nitrogen, inflows into the lake could reduce bloom severity and longevity.
Data can be found at NCBI BioProject PRJNA813570.
Key findings
NCBI BioProject PRJNA813570
| Short title | Molecular characterization of Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs) |
|---|---|
| Status | Not started |