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Applied and Environmental Microbiology, November 1998, p. 4128-4133, Vol. 64, No. 11
0099-2240/98/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1998, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.

Bacteriophage Diversity in the North Sea

Antje Wichels,1,* Stefan S. Biel,2 Hans R. Gelderblom,2 Thorsten Brinkhoff,3 Gerard Muyzer,3,dagger and Christian Schütt1

Biologische Anstalt Helgoland, D-27498 Helgoland,1 Robert-Koch Institut, D-13353 Berlin,2 and Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, D-28359 Bremen,3 Germany

Received 29 June 1998/Accepted 13 August 1998

In recent years interest in bacteriophages in aquatic environments has increased. Electron microscopy studies have revealed high numbers of phage particles (104 to 107 particles per ml) in the marine environment. However, the ecological role of these bacteriophages is still unknown, and the role of the phages in the control of bacterioplankton by lysis and the potential for gene transfer are disputed. Even the basic questions of the genetic relationships of the phages and the diversity of phage-host systems in aquatic environments have not been answered. We investigated the diversity of 22 phage-host systems after 85 phages were collected at one station near a German island, Helgoland, located in the North Sea. The relationships among the phages were determined by electron microscopy, DNA-DNA hybridization, and host range studies. On the basis of morphology, 11 phages were assigned to the virus family Myoviridae, 7 phages were assigned to the family Siphoviridae, and 4 phages were assigned to the family Podoviridae. DNA-DNA hybridization confirmed that there was no DNA homology between phages belonging to different families. We found that the 22 marine bacteriophages belonged to 13 different species. The host bacteria were differentiated by morphological and physiological tests and by 16S ribosomal DNA sequencing. All of the bacteria were gram negative, facultatively anaerobic, motile, and coccoid. The 16S rRNA sequences of the bacteria exhibited high levels of similarity (98 to 99%) with the sequences of organisms belonging to the genus Pseudoalteromonas, which belongs to the gamma  subdivision of the class Proteobacteria.

* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Biologische Anstalt Helgoland, D-27483 Helgoland, Germany. E-mail: AWichels{at}AWI-Bremerhaven.de.

dagger Present address: Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, NL-1790 AB Den Burg, Texel, The Netherlands.

Applied and Environmental Microbiology, November 1998, p. 4128-4133, Vol. 64, No. 11
0099-2240/98/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1998, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.


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