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Applied and Environmental Microbiology, September 1999, p. 3843-3849, Vol. 65, No. 9
0099-2240/99/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1999, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
Distribution and Diversity of Sulfur-Oxidizing
Thiomicrospira spp. at a Shallow-Water Hydrothermal Vent in
the Aegean Sea (Milos, Greece)
Thorsten
Brinkhoff,1,
Stefan M.
Sievert,2
Jan
Kuever,2 and
Gerard
Muyzer1,*
Molecular Ecology
Group1 and Department of
Microbiology,2 Max-Planck-Institute for
Marine Microbiology, D-28359 Bremen, Germany
Received 21 December 1998/Accepted 9 June 1999
A shallow-water hydrothermal vent system in the Aegean Sea close to
the island of Milos (Greece) was chosen to study the diversity and
distribution of the chemolithoautotrophic sulfur-oxidizing bacterium
Thiomicrospira. Cell numbers in samples from different regions around a solitary vent decreased toward the center of the vent
(horizontal distribution), as well as with depth (vertical distribution), corresponding to an increase in temperature (from ca. 25 to 60°C) and a decrease in pH (from ca. pH 7 to 5).
Thiomicrospira was one of the most abundant culturable
sulfur oxidizers and was even dominant in one region. Phylogenetic
analysis of Thiomicrospira spp. present in the highest
most-probable-number (MPN) dilutions revealed that most of the obtained
sequences grouped in two new closely related clusters within the
Thiomicrospira branch. Two different new isolates, i.e.,
Milos-T1 and Milos-T2, were obtained from high-dilution
(10
5) enrichments. Phylogenetic analysis indicated that
isolate Milos-T1 is related to the recently described
Thiomicrospira kuenenii and Hydrogenovibrio
marinus, whereas isolate Milos-T2 grouped with the MPN sequences
of cluster 2. The predominance of strain Milos-T2 was indicated by its
identification in several environmental samples by hybridization
analysis of denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE) patterns and
by sequencing of one of the corresponding bands, i.e., ML-1, from the
DGGE gel. The results shown in this paper support earlier indications
that Thiomicrospira species are important members of
hydrothermal vent communities.
*
Corresponding author. Present address: Netherlands
Institute for Sea Research, P.O. Box 59, NL-1790 AB Den Burg, The
Netherlands. Phone: 31-222-369-521. Fax: 31-222-319-674. E-mail:
gmuyzer{at}nioz.nl.

Present address: Institute for Chemistry and Biology of the Marine
Environment, Carl von Ossietzky Universität, D-26111 Oldenburg,
Germany.
Applied and Environmental Microbiology, September 1999, p. 3843-3849, Vol. 65, No. 9
0099-2240/99/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1999, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
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