Community structure and diversity of aerobic anoxygenic phototrophic bacteria in soil crusts and subsoil of Hunshandake deserts

Abstract:

[Objective] To discover the community structure and diversity of aerobic anoxygenic phototrophic bacteria (AAPB) in different types of soil crusts (BSCs) and soils under them.[Methods] The pufM gene was sequenced via the Illumina MiSeq second-generation high-throughput sequencing platform, and the community structure and diversity of AAPB were analyzed by bioinformatics analysis.[Results] In the BSCs and soils under them, Proteobacteria and Alpha-Proteobacteria were the main phylum, and the main genus were Bradyrhizobium (9.69% to 90.02%), Brevundimonas (0.83% to 16.04%), Methylobacterium (1.74% to 12.56%), Rhodospirillum (0.91% to 32.87%), Roseiflexus (0.02% to 1.79%) and Sphingomonas (0.13% to 11.23%). Biological soil crusts and soil under them had the similar community structure, but different in the abundance. With the development of BSCs, the species richness and diversity of the crusts and their underlying soils increased.[Conclusion] The community structure of AAPB in BSCs of Hunshandake sandy land is relatively complex, which is significant different from that in water and general soil environment. The diversity of AAPB is high and the diversity increases with the BSCs development, which suggests that AAPB plays an important role in the stability of desert ecosystem.