Data from: Environmental switching during biofilm development in a cold seep system and functional determinants of species sorting

The functional basis for species sorting theory remains elusive,
especially for microbial community assembly in deep-sea environments.
Using artificial surface-based biofilm models, our recent work revealed
taxonomic succession during biofilm development in a newly defined cold
seep system, the Thuwal cold seeps II, which comprises a brine pool and
the adjacent normal bottom water (NBW) to form a metacommunity via the
potential immigration of organisms from one patch to another. Here, we
designed an experiment to investigate the effects of environmental
switching between the brine pool and the NBW on biofilm assembly, which
could reflect environmental filtering effects during bacterial immigration
to new environments. Analyses of 16S rRNA genes of 71 biofilm samples
suggested that the microbial composition of biofilms established in new
environments was determined by both the source community and the
incubation conditions. Moreover, a comparison of 18 metagenomes provided
evidence for biofilm community assembly that was based primarily on
functional features rather than taxonomic identities; metal ion resistance
and amino acid metabolism were the major species sorting determinants for
the succession of biofilm communities. Genome binning and pathway
reconstruction of two bacterial species (Marinobacter sp. and Oleispira
sp.) further demonstrated metal ion resistance and amino acid metabolism
as functional traits conferring the survival of habitat generalists in
both the brine pool and NBW. The results of this study shed new light on
microbial community assembly in special habitats and bridge a gap in
species sorting theory.