Abstract
Studies of microbial community structure in intertidal and supratidal beach sands along the California and Gulf of Mexico coasts have begun to reveal geographical patterns in microbial diversity through the use of next generation sequencing technology. Only a few studies have targeted communities along the Eastern seaboard, leaving a variety of microbial ecosystems uncharacterized. In this study, we examine the microbial community structure within three South Carolina beaches along the Grand Strand via sequencing of the V4 region of the 16S rRNA gene to discern relationships between diversity and temporal or regional factors. Gammaproteobacteria, Planctomycetes, Acidobacteria, and Actinobacteria dominated the composition of these beaches. Diversity analyses revealed that highly diverse communities were similar in overall composition and diversity but showed different levels of community structure stability over time. The community structure in Pawleys Island sands showed no significant change over time, while Garden City experienced significant shifts between each sampling date. Community structure also differed between beaches and, to a lesser degree, sampling date. These data provide evidence of the high microbial diversity within these beach sands and suggest that even though beaches of the same geographic region can show similarity in composition and diversity at a particular timepoint, the nature of their community structure and underlying diversity may differ comparatively and over time.
Highlights
Marine beaches represent transitional ecosystems that connect terrestrial and marine environments and are widespread in the United States, which has a coastline extending over 95,000 total miles [1]
This study describes the microbial diversity within marine beach sands from the intertidal and supratidal zones of three South Carolina beaches in the same geographic region
Environmental variables had the greatest influence on samples from Garden City (p = 0.002), and a much lower impact on samples from Myrtle Beach (p = 0.05) and Pawleys Island (p = 0.034). These data on the structure of marine beach sand communities add to the knowledge base focused on microbial communities above the subtidal zone [13,14,24,26,29]
Summary
Marine beaches represent transitional ecosystems that connect terrestrial and marine environments and are widespread in the United States, which has a coastline extending over 95,000 total miles [1]. Sandy beach ecosystems represent a transitional link between land and sea, providing a means of nutrient transfer between them and provide important ecosystem services like water filtration and purification and nutrient cycling and mineralization [11,12,13,14]. These processes are carried out by both microbial activity and hydrological processes [11,13]. A dense saltwater wedge comprises the majority of the subtidal zone, which intermingles with the overlying freshwater to allow for the exchange and transport of both nutrients and microbes to and from off-shore areas [13,14,16]
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