Microbial Community Composition in Lakes - Taxonomic characteristics of the clones at North Temperate Lakes LTER 2000 - 2007

Microbial community composition is inferred by a combination of automated ribosomal
intergenic spacer analysis (ARISA) and PCR-generated clone library analysis. Clone libraries
include both the 16S rRNA gene and the 16S-23S ribosomal intergenic spacer fragment.
Phylogenetic assignments for individual ARISA fragments are obtained by comparing the ARISA
fragment length from each clone to all of the profiles stored in our database. We have
analyzed over 3900 clones obtained from 41 lakes that represent the range of trophic types
found in temperate landscapes. Querying by taxonomic characteristics of the clone allows the
user to retrieve clone IDs, sequence data, and characteristics of the sequence (length,
chimera status, accession number, taxonomic affiliation). The data can be filtered by clone
ID, ARISA fragment length (raw or binned), and/or taxonomic characteristics (Phylum and
Phylum-Class). The output includes links to individual clone records, which contain more
detailed information about how the clone was generated (researcher, library ID, project ID,
primer sets used, etc.).