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Appl Environ Microbiol. 1986 September; 52(3): 504-509
Copyright © 1986, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Degradation of Dead Microbial Biomass in a Marine Sediment

Biology Department, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia B3H 4J1, Canada

ABSTRACT

The availability of dead microbial biomass in a marine beach sand to degradation and mineralization was examined. Microbial sand populations were labeled with [¹⁴C]glutamic acid, [³H]adenine, or [³H]thymidine and killed with chloroform. Live sand or seawater (or both) was added to the sterile labeled sand, and biochemical components of the populations were monitored for 10 days. Labeled RNA was degraded more quickly than labeled DNA, but both nucleic acids were degraded to approximately the same extent (60 to 70%). ³H₂O was a major acid-soluble breakdown product. RNA (and possibly DNA) breakdown products were reincorporated into DNA (and possibly RNA) during the incubation period. In addition to metabolite salvage, 32% of the total macromolecular ¹⁴C was respired in the 10-day period regardless of whether sand or seawater was used as the inoculum. Respiration was essentially complete in 3 days, whereas nucleic acid degradation continued throughout the 10-day incubation. The results indicate that dead microbial biomass is a labile component of the sediment ecosystem.

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