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Title: Characterization of Bacterial and Fungal Assemblages From Historically Contaminated Metalliferous Soils Using Metagenomics Coupled With Diffusion Chambers and Microbial Traps

Abstract

The majority of environmental microbiomes are not amenable to cultivation under standard laboratory growth conditions and hence remain uncharacterized. For environmental applications, such as bioremediation, it is necessary to isolate microbes performing the desired function, which may not necessarily be the fast growing or the copiotroph microbiota. Toward this end, cultivation and isolation of microbial strains using diffusion chambers (DC) and/or microbial traps (MT) have both been recently demonstrated to be effective strategies because microbial enrichment is facilitated by soil nutrients and not by synthetically defined media, thus simulating their native habitat. In this study, DC/MT chambers were established using soils collected from two US Department of Energy (DOE) sites with long-term history of heavy metal contamination, including mercury (Hg). To characterize the contamination levels and nutrient status, soils were first analyzed for total mercury (THg), methylmercury (MeHg), total carbon (TC), total nitrogen (TN), and total phosphorus (TP). Multivariate statistical analysis on these measurements facilitated binning of soils under high, medium and low levels of contamination. Bacterial and fungal microbiomes that developed within the DC and MT chambers were evaluated using comparative metagenomics, revealing Chthoniobacter, Burkholderia and Bradyrhizobium spp., as the predominant bacteria while Penicillium, Thielavia, and Trichoderma predominated amongmore » fungi. Many of these core microbiomes were also retrieved as axenic isolates. Furthermore, canonical correspondence analysis (CCA) of biogeochemical measurements, metal concentrations and bacterial communities revealed a positive correlation of Chthoniobacter/Bradyrhizobium spp., to THg whereas Burkholderia spp., correlated with MeHg. Penicillium spp., correlated with THg whereas Trichoderma spp., and Aspergillus spp., correlated with MeHg, from the MT approach. This is the first metagenomics-based assessment, isolation and characterization of soil-borne bacterial and fungal communities colonizing the diffusion chambers (DC) and microbial traps (MT) established with long-term metal contaminated soils. Overall, this study provides proof-of-concept for the successful application of DC/MT based assessment of mercury resistant (HgR) microbiomes in legacy metal-contaminated soils, having complex contamination issues. Overall, this study brings out the significance of microbial communities and their relevance in context to heavy metal cycling for better stewardship and restoration of such historically contaminated systems.« less

Authors:
; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ;
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE
OSTI Identifier:
1632765
Alternate Identifier(s):
OSTI ID: 1651301
Grant/Contract Number:  
AC05-00OR22725; AC09-08SR22470; 0000403081; 0000403082; 0000456318
Resource Type:
Published Article
Journal Name:
Frontiers in Microbiology
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Name: Frontiers in Microbiology Journal Volume: 11; Journal ID: ISSN 1664-302X
Publisher:
Frontiers Research Foundation
Country of Publication:
Switzerland
Language:
English
Subject:
59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES; mercury resistance; metagenomics; diffusion chamber; microbial trap; culturomics

Citation Formats

Pathak, Ashish, Jaswal, Rajneesh, Xu, Xiaoyu, White, John R., Edwards, III, Bobby, Hunt, Jaden, Brooks, Scott, Rathore, Rajesh Singh, Agarwal, Meenakshi, and Chauhan, Ashvini. Characterization of Bacterial and Fungal Assemblages From Historically Contaminated Metalliferous Soils Using Metagenomics Coupled With Diffusion Chambers and Microbial Traps. Switzerland: N. p., 2020. Web. doi:10.3389/fmicb.2020.01024.
Pathak, Ashish, Jaswal, Rajneesh, Xu, Xiaoyu, White, John R., Edwards, III, Bobby, Hunt, Jaden, Brooks, Scott, Rathore, Rajesh Singh, Agarwal, Meenakshi, & Chauhan, Ashvini. Characterization of Bacterial and Fungal Assemblages From Historically Contaminated Metalliferous Soils Using Metagenomics Coupled With Diffusion Chambers and Microbial Traps. Switzerland. https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2020.01024
Pathak, Ashish, Jaswal, Rajneesh, Xu, Xiaoyu, White, John R., Edwards, III, Bobby, Hunt, Jaden, Brooks, Scott, Rathore, Rajesh Singh, Agarwal, Meenakshi, and Chauhan, Ashvini. Wed . "Characterization of Bacterial and Fungal Assemblages From Historically Contaminated Metalliferous Soils Using Metagenomics Coupled With Diffusion Chambers and Microbial Traps". Switzerland. https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2020.01024.
@article{osti_1632765,
title = {Characterization of Bacterial and Fungal Assemblages From Historically Contaminated Metalliferous Soils Using Metagenomics Coupled With Diffusion Chambers and Microbial Traps},
author = {Pathak, Ashish and Jaswal, Rajneesh and Xu, Xiaoyu and White, John R. and Edwards, III, Bobby and Hunt, Jaden and Brooks, Scott and Rathore, Rajesh Singh and Agarwal, Meenakshi and Chauhan, Ashvini},
abstractNote = {The majority of environmental microbiomes are not amenable to cultivation under standard laboratory growth conditions and hence remain uncharacterized. For environmental applications, such as bioremediation, it is necessary to isolate microbes performing the desired function, which may not necessarily be the fast growing or the copiotroph microbiota. Toward this end, cultivation and isolation of microbial strains using diffusion chambers (DC) and/or microbial traps (MT) have both been recently demonstrated to be effective strategies because microbial enrichment is facilitated by soil nutrients and not by synthetically defined media, thus simulating their native habitat. In this study, DC/MT chambers were established using soils collected from two US Department of Energy (DOE) sites with long-term history of heavy metal contamination, including mercury (Hg). To characterize the contamination levels and nutrient status, soils were first analyzed for total mercury (THg), methylmercury (MeHg), total carbon (TC), total nitrogen (TN), and total phosphorus (TP). Multivariate statistical analysis on these measurements facilitated binning of soils under high, medium and low levels of contamination. Bacterial and fungal microbiomes that developed within the DC and MT chambers were evaluated using comparative metagenomics, revealing Chthoniobacter, Burkholderia and Bradyrhizobium spp., as the predominant bacteria while Penicillium, Thielavia, and Trichoderma predominated among fungi. Many of these core microbiomes were also retrieved as axenic isolates. Furthermore, canonical correspondence analysis (CCA) of biogeochemical measurements, metal concentrations and bacterial communities revealed a positive correlation of Chthoniobacter/Bradyrhizobium spp., to THg whereas Burkholderia spp., correlated with MeHg. Penicillium spp., correlated with THg whereas Trichoderma spp., and Aspergillus spp., correlated with MeHg, from the MT approach. This is the first metagenomics-based assessment, isolation and characterization of soil-borne bacterial and fungal communities colonizing the diffusion chambers (DC) and microbial traps (MT) established with long-term metal contaminated soils. Overall, this study provides proof-of-concept for the successful application of DC/MT based assessment of mercury resistant (HgR) microbiomes in legacy metal-contaminated soils, having complex contamination issues. Overall, this study brings out the significance of microbial communities and their relevance in context to heavy metal cycling for better stewardship and restoration of such historically contaminated systems.},
doi = {10.3389/fmicb.2020.01024},
journal = {Frontiers in Microbiology},
number = ,
volume = 11,
place = {Switzerland},
year = {Wed Jun 10 00:00:00 EDT 2020},
month = {Wed Jun 10 00:00:00 EDT 2020}
}

Journal Article:
Free Publicly Available Full Text
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https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2020.01024

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