Bacterial diversity of soil in the vicinity of Pindari glacier, Himalayan mountain ranges, India, using culturable bacteria and soil 16S rRNA gene clones

Abstract

Three 16S rRNA gene clone libraries (P1L, P4L and P8L) were constructed using three soil samples (P1S, P4S and P8S) collected near Pindari glacier, Himalayas. The three libraries yielded a total of 703 clones. Actinobacteria, Firmicutes and Proteobacteria were common to the three libraries. In addition to the above P1L and P8L shared the phyla Acidobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Gemmatimonadetes and Planctomycetes. Phyla Chlamydiae, Chlorobi, Chloroflexi, Dictyoglomi, Fibrobacteres, Nitrospirae, Verrucomicrobia, candidate division SPAM and candidate TM7s TM7a phylum were present only in P1L. Rarefaction analysis indicated that the bacterial diversity in P4S and P8S soil samples was representative of the sample. Principal component analysis (PCA) revealed that P1S and P8S were different from P4S soil sample. PCA also indicated that arsenic content, pH, Cr and altitude influence the observed differences in the percentage of specific OTUs in the three 16S rRNA gene clone libraries. The observed bacterial diversity was similar to that observed for other Himalayan and non-polar cold habitats. A total of 40 strains of bacteria were isolated from the above three soil samples and based on the morphology 20 bacterial strains were selected for further characterization. The 20 bacteria belonged to 12 different genera. All the isolates were psychro-, halo- and alkalitolerant. Amylase and urease activities were detected in majority of the strains but lipase and protease activities were not detected. Long chain, saturated, unsaturated and branched fatty acids were predominant in the psychrotolerant bacteria.

Bacterial diversity of Drass, cold desert in Western Himalaya, and its comparison with Antarctic and Arctic

“…Cyanobacteria are the predominant biota in cold polar environments and play an important role in the carbon and nitrogen economy of tundra and polar desert soils (Bonilla et al 2005;Adams et al 2006;Vincent 2007;Varin et al 2012). This photosynthetic phylum is either reported to be present in low frequency or absent in the Himalayan regions (Pradhan et al 2010;Shivaji et al 2011;Stres et al 2014). Gemmatimonadetes and Verrucomicrobia found in the present study were reported from other cold habitats, though at a low frequency (Steven et al 2007;Wagner et al 2009;Pradhan et al 2010;Wu et al 2012).…”

Change of Soil Bacteria Diversity between Desertification and Restoration

“…Verrucomicrobia, Chloroflexi, Gemmatiomonadetes, Bacteroidetes, Planctomycetes, Nitrospira, Deinococcus-Thermus and Armatimonadetes were present in one or two libraries but the frequency of distribution was truncated. These observations are in accord with some other earlier studies [51]- [53].…”

Subglacial and Proglacial Ecosystem Responses to Climate Change

“…At five glacier forefields near Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard, the mean total cell count was 6.5 x 10 7 cells g -1 (Kaštovská et al, 2005), and at Pindari Glacier in the Himalayas it ranged between 2.2 and 8.7 x 10 8 cells g -1 sediment (Shivaji et al, 2011). Based on these studies, the magnitude range of proglacial communities is within 10 7 -10 9 cells g -1 sediment.…”