Sponge symbiotic bacterial communities Metagenome

Sponges (Porifera) attract researchers'' interest due to the ability to accumulate a wide variety of microorganisms, such as heterotrophic bacteria, cyanobacteria, microscopic algae, archaea, dinoflagellates, fungi, etc. within their body. For the first time, 454 pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA gene fragments was applied to the analysis of bacterial communities associated with freshwater sponges living in Lake Baikal, the most ancient and the deepest lake on the planet.

海绵（多孔动物门Porifera）因其可在体内富集异养细菌（heterotrophic bacteria）、蓝细菌（cyanobacteria）、微藻（microscopic algae）、古菌（archaea）、甲藻（dinoflagellates）、真菌（fungi）等多种微生物而受到研究者的广泛关注。本研究首次采用基于16S rRNA基因片段（16S rRNA gene fragments）的454焦磷酸测序（454 pyrosequencing）技术，对栖息于贝加尔湖——这颗星球上最古老且最深的湖泊——中的淡水海绵关联细菌群落进行了分析。