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Purahong W, Hossen S, Nawaz A, Sadubsarn D, Tanunchai B, Dommert S, Noll M, Ampornpan LA, Werukamkul P, Wubet T. Life on the Rocks: First Insights Into the Microbiota of the Threatened Aquatic Rheophyte Hanseniella heterophylla. Front Plant Sci 2021; 12:634960. [PMID: 34194446 PMCID: PMC8238419 DOI: 10.3389/fpls.2021.634960] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/29/2020] [Accepted: 04/15/2021] [Indexed: 05/15/2023]
Abstract
Little is known about microbial communities of aquatic plants despite their crucial ecosystem function in aquatic ecosystems. Here, we analyzed the microbiota of an aquatic rheophyte, Hanseniella heterophylla, growing at three areas differing in their degree of anthropogenic disturbance in Thailand employing a metabarcoding approach. Our results show that diverse taxonomic and functional groups of microbes colonize H. heterophylla. Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria, Dothideomycetes, and Sordariomycetes form the backbone of the microbiota. Surprisingly, the beneficial microbes reported from plant microbiomes in terrestrial habitats, such as N-fixing bacteria and ectomycorrhizal fungi, were also frequently detected. We showed that biofilms for attachment of H. heterophylla plants to rocks may associate with diverse cyanobacteria (distributed in eight families, including Chroococcidiopsaceae, Coleofasciculaceae, Leptolyngbyaceae, Microcystaceae, Nostocaceae, Phormidiaceae, Synechococcaceae, and Xenococcaceae) and other rock biofilm-forming bacteria (mainly Acinetobacter, Pseudomonas, and Flavobacterium). We found distinct community compositions of both bacteria and fungi at high and low anthropogenic disturbance levels regardless of the study areas. In the highly disturbed area, we found strong enrichment of Gammaproteobacteria and Tremellomycetes coupled with significant decline of total bacterial OTU richness. Bacteria involved with sulfamethoxazole (antibiotic) degradation and human pathogenic fungi (Candida, Cryptococcus, Trichosporon, and Rhodotorula) were exclusively detected as indicator microorganisms in H. heterophylla microbiota growing in a highly disturbed area, which can pose a major threat to human health. We conclude that aquatic plant microbiota are sensitive to anthropogenic disturbance. Our results also unravel the potential use of this plant as biological indicators in remediation or treatment of such disturbed ecosystems.
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Affiliation(s)
- Witoon Purahong
- Department of Soil Ecology, UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Halle, Germany
- *Correspondence: Witoon Purahong, ;
| | - Shakhawat Hossen
- Department of Soil Ecology, UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Halle, Germany
- Institute of Ecology and Evolution, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, Jena, Germany
| | - Ali Nawaz
- Department of Community Ecology, UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Halle, Germany
- Department of Civil, Geo and Environmental Engineering, Technical University of Munich, Garching, Germany
| | - Dolaya Sadubsarn
- Department of Soil Ecology, UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Halle, Germany
| | - Benjawan Tanunchai
- Department of Soil Ecology, UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Halle, Germany
| | - Sven Dommert
- Department of Soil Ecology, UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Halle, Germany
| | - Matthias Noll
- Institute for Bioanalysis, Coburg University of Applied Sciences and Arts, Coburg, Germany
| | - La-aw Ampornpan
- Department of Biology, Srinakharinwirot University, Bangkok, Thailand
| | - Petcharat Werukamkul
- Faculty of Science and Technology, Rajamangala University of Technology Phra Nakhon, Bangkok, Thailand
- Petcharat Werukamkul,
| | - Tesfaye Wubet
- Department of Community Ecology, UFZ-Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Halle, Germany
- German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research, Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany
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