Freshwater metagenomes from Lake Zurich, Switzerland

Lake Zurich is a large (68km2), deep (136m), prealpine lake in Switzerland. This study describes the microbial communities of the Lake using high throughput sequencing. Water samples from different times and different depths representing the epi- and hypolimnion were taken at the deepest part of the lake (47°18' N 8°34' E). 1-4 L of water were prefiltered through a plankton net (20 µm) and a 5-µm filter and then filtered onto polysulfone filters with a pore size of 0.22 µm. DNA was extracted from the 0.22 µm filter (small, planktonic fraction) to obtain genomic DNA of the microbial community.