Changes of microbial abundance and functional genes in oil and gas under gaseous hydrocarbon condition

Abstract:

Abstract: [Objective] Hydrocarbon microseepage is a natural phenomenon that hydrocarbon gases of subsurface petroleum accumulations migrate upward by reservoir pressure. The detection of the activity and distribution of these highly specialized populations can be used to forecast the existence of oil and gas deposits. However, the hydrocarbon-oxidizing bacterial population are usually not predominant in soil samples above the typical onshore oil and gas reservoirs. It is hard to assess the abundance of hydrocarbon-oxidizing bacteria. [Methods] In this study, changes of microbial abundance and functional genes were studied. [Results] Under gaseous hydrocarbon condition, changes of methane and butane oxidizing bacteria were different. Furthermore, changes of functional genes indicated that genome analysis was more proper for microbial anomalies detection. [Conclusion] The profiling data of this study provide a comprehensive insight into gene expression profiles and lay the foundation for optimizing the microbial prospecting technology.