Temperature adaptation of microbial communities in different horizons of Siberian permafrost-affected soils from the Lena Delta

Abstract

The cell membrane phospholipid (PL) inventory of microbial populations in a Siberian permafrost soil of the Lena Delta was analysed to examine as to how the microbial populations within different horizons of the active layer were adapted to the extreme temperature gradient in this environment. One surface-near and one permafrost-near soil sample were taken from the active layer on Samoylov Island in the southern central Lena Delta (Siberia) and in each case incubated at 4 and 28 °C. Subsequently, the phospholipid cell membrane composition of the indigenous microbial populations was qualitatively and quantitatively determined and compared. In both horizons, the incubation at 4 °C is characterized by a shift in the PL inventory to more short chain fatty acids. A significant trend in the proportions of saturated and unsaturated fatty acids, however, was not detected. A higher proportion of both short chain and unsaturated fatty acids counterbalances the effect of decreasing cell membrane fluidity with decreasing environmental temperature. Thus, the adaptation of the permafrost microbial populations within the different horizons to varying ambient temperature conditions appears to be mainly regulated by the chain length of the phospholipid fatty acids. Although there is almost no change in the proportions of unsaturated fatty acids between the 4 and 28 °C incubation experiments, the permafrost-near horizon in general contains more unsaturated fatty acids than the surface-near horizon and a higher proportion of short chain fatty acids. This suggests that the lipid inventory of the microbial population nearer to the perennially frozen ground is more adapted to lower temperatures than that of the microbial community from the surface-near horizon, which seems to show a higher flexibility toward higher temperature conditions. The permafrost-near horizon appears to be dominated by psychrophilic species, while the surface-near horizon is characterized by a mesophilic-dominated microbial community.