Microbial diversity and related secondary metabolite gene assortment at an estuarine mangrove ecosystem

Abstract

Mangrove ecosystems are a major biodiversity hotspot of the world. The world heritage site Sundarbans is an archipelago with an estuarine mangrove ecosystem. It is assumed that each individual Island of the Sundarbans possess a unique biodiversity due to the seasonal variation of physicochemical parameters, along with tidal dynamics of Bay of Bengal. This study unfolds a time series analysis of microbial diversity using high-resolution 16S rRNA tag pyrosequencing. Eight soil samples were collected over three years at a pristine temperate estuarine site located at the sea mangrove interface at the island of Kalash. Apart from the predominant phyla such as Proteobacteria [31.6%], Chloroflexi [10.7%], Firmicutes [7%] Bacteroidetes [7%] and Actinobacteria [1.2%], soil from Kalash also contained a significant amount of rare phyla NC10 and WS3 categorized as microbial dark matter (MDM). Variation in bacterial community composition occurs mainly as a result of the seasonal changes and consequent alterations of physicochemical parameters leading to microbial adaptations. Further we performed functional metagenomics to estimate the possibility of the synthesis of new natural compounds by diverse Polyketide Synthase (PKS). The data indicated diverse microbial origins of keto synthase sequences from polyketide synthase genes. Presence of this unique keto synthases confirmed the existence of a potential microbiome which may be capable of producing novel small molecules. This is the pioneering report to correlate the microbial community structure of Sundarbans with their potential to produce essential bioactive compounds.