Metagenomic shotgun sequencing of bacterioplankton of Weddell Sea bacterioplankton

Prokaryotic communities of the Weddell Sea were investigated by means of shotgun metagenomic sequencing. Sampling was conducted during the Polarstern expeditions PS111 and PS117 between 10 and 18 February 2018 and on 24 January 2019, respectively, with a rosette sampler equipped with Niskin bottles. A CTD system was used to determine the continuous depth profiles of temperature and salinity. Samples were collected on 0.22 micrometer polycarbonate filters and nucleic acids were extracted using the AllPrep DNA/RNA mini kit (Qiagen). The project was funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) under the grant numbers PI784/3-1 (CombiBac) and PI784/4-1 (BacDMS).