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Appl. Environ. Microbiol., Dec 1997, 4729-4733, Vol 63, No. 12
MA Munson, DB Nedwell and TM Embley
The Archaea present in salt marsh sediment samples from a tidal creek and
from an adjacent area of vegetative marshland, both of which showed active
methanogenesis and sulfate reduction, were sampled by using 16S rRNA gene
libraries created with Archaea-specific primers. None of the sequences were
the same as reference sequences from cultured taxa, although some were
closely related to sequences from methanogens previously isolated from
marine sediments. A wide range of Euryarchaeota sequences were recovered,
but no sequences from Methanococcus, Methanobacterium, or the Crenarchaeota
were recovered. Clusters of closely related sequences were common and
generally contained sequences from both sites, suggesting that some related
organisms were present in both samples. Recovery of sequences closely
related to those of methanogens such as Methanococcoides and Methanolobus,
which can use substrates other than hydrogen, provides support for
published hypotheses that such methanogens are probably important in
sulfate-rich sediments and identifies some likely candidates. Sequences
closely related to those of methanogens such as Methanoculleus and
Methanogenium, which are capable of using hydrogen, were also discovered,
in agreement with previous inhibitor and process measurements suggesting
that these taxa are present at low levels of activity. More surprisingly,
we recovered a variety of sequences closely related to those from different
halophilic Archaea and a cluster of divergent sequences specifically
related to the marine group II archaeal sequences recently shown by PCR and
probing to have a cosmopolitan distribution in marine samples.
Copyright © 1997, American Society for Microbiology
Phylogenetic diversity of Archaea in sediment samples from a coastal salt marsh
Department of Zoology, Natural History Museum, London, United Kingdom.
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