Bacterial Diversity in Aquatic Ecosystems over the Central Himalayas, Nepal: Progress and Future Perspectives

Abstract

Nepal hosts a large area of freshwater aquatic ecosystem including glacier associated system like glacier-fed streams and lakes as well as stream fed lowland lakes. Bacteriological studies are very important in aquatic ecosystems as bacteria are the major participants in biogeochemical cycles and food web structures. This study reviewed available literature in bacteriological studies of aquatic ecosystems in the Central Himalayas, Nepal and revealed that such studies are very limited. Thus, we conclude that future research works need to proceed through the latest molecular methods with high throughput technique using multiple environmental factors in the aquatic ecosystem.

Impact of climate change on the ecosystem of the central Himalayas, Nepal

“…tropical, subtropical, temperate, and subalpine to alpine snowcapped mountains (Bhattarai et al, 2004). The central Himalayas, Nepal divided into four major river basins i.e., Koshi River Basin, Gandaki River Basin, Karnali River Basin, and Mahakali River Basin from east to west respectively (Adhikari et al, 2019b) (Figure 3). The climate of the central Himalayas is governed by South Indian Monsoon during summer and westerly during winter.…”

“…The aquatic ecosystem includes freshwater ecosystems and marine ecosystems (Adhikari et al, 2019a(Adhikari et al, , 2019bPaudel et al, 2017;Sharma et al, 2020). Nepal only harbors a freshwater ecosystem as it is a land-locked country and is the most vulnerable type of ecosystem in the world which is very sensitive to climate change.…”