- Cyanobacteria of biological soil crusts (BSCs) represent an important part of circumpolar
and Alpine ecosystems, serve as indicators for ecological condition and climate
change, and function as ecosystem engineers by soil stabilization or carbon and nitrogen
input. The characterization of cyanobacteria from both polar regions remains
extremely important to understand geographic distribution patterns and community
compositions. This study is the first of its kind revealing the efficiency of combining
denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE), light microscopy and culture-based
16S rRNA gene sequencing, applied to polar and Alpine cyanobacteria dominated
BSCs. This study aimed to show the living proportion of cyanobacteria as an extension
to previously published meta-transcriptome
data of the same study sites.
Molecular fingerprints showed a distinct clustering of cyanobacterial communities
with a close relationship between Arctic and Alpine populations, which differed from
those found in Antarctica. Species richness and diversity supported these results,
which were also confirmed by microscopic investigations of living cyanobacteria
from the BSCs. Isolate-based
sequencing corroborated these trends as cold biome
clades were assigned, which included a potentially new Arctic clade of Oculatella.
Thus, our results contribute to the debate regarding biogeography of cyanobacteria
of cold biomes.
