Arctic Ocean Bacterial 16S rRNA

The composition of bacterial communities in the Arctic Ocean remains under-characterized, particularly in the sea-ice covered regions, as well as in deep waters. This project aimed to characterize the structure of bacterial communities in the Arctic water column, sediments, and on particles. The organic matter-degrading capabilities of these microbial communities were also examined using enzymatic assays with structurally diverse polysaccharide and peptide substrates. By combining high throughput sequencing and enzymatic activity assays, we were able to investigate the structure-function relationships of bacterial communities in the Arctic Ocean.