Microbial diversity in migrating ripple and stationary sediments of sandy lowland streams

The sandy sediments in lowland streams can form migrating ripples creating a dynamic environment for microbial communities as the sediment grains experience a high frequent cycle of movement and rest. We studied the influence of the phenomenon of sand transported at contrasting frequencies on microbial diversity by collecting sediments from five lowland streams in northeastern Germany between May and June 2020. Our sampling sites included the streams Verlorenwasser, Pulsnitz and Plane as well as the rivers Spree and Oker. We compared the diversity of bacteria, fungi, and phagotrophic protists at two different sediment depths from migrating ripple and stable sediment patches at each sampling site.