A chemical and microbial characterization of selected mud volcanoes in Trinidad reveals pathogens introduced by surface water and rain water

Schulze‐Makuch, Dirk; Haque, Shirin; Beckles, Denise M.; Schmitt‐Kopplin, Philippe; Harir, Mourad; Schneider, Bernd Uwe; Stumpp, Christine; Wagner, Dirk

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.136087

Cited by 7 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 62 publications

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“…Interestingly, Schulze-Makuch et al . 7 reported that the unique microbial ecology (Bacteria and Archaea) of Trinidad’s Pitch Lake, located in La Brea in southwest Trinidad, the largest natural deposit of asphalt in the world, can be considered as a “terrestrial analogue” for understanding the biotic potential of hydrocarbon lakes located on Titan—Saturn's largest moon.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Unfortunately, such characterizations were made for bacteria and Archaea but, not for fungi. It is also important to note that identified microorganisms may have been introduced into the MV exudates from surface water (rain water) or due to a seasonal high groundwater table 7 . MVs are one of the visible signs of the presence of oil and gas reserves buried deep beneath land and sea and their distribution is strongly associated to the distribution of the world's petroleum assets as was reported for the South Caspian sedimentary basin 33 .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Biodiversity and biocatalyst activity of culturable hydrocarbonoclastic fungi isolated from Marac–Moruga mud volcano in South Trinidad

Ramdass

Rampersad

2021

Sci Rep

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Mud volcanoes (MVs) are visible signs of oil and gas reserves present deep beneath land and sea. The Marac MV in Trinidad is the only MV associated with natural hydrocarbon seeps. Petrogenic polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in its sediments must undergo biogeochemical cycles of detoxification as they can enter the water table and aquifers threatening ecosystems and biota. Recurrent hydrocarbon seep activity of MVs consolidates the growth of hydrocarbonoclastic fungal communities. Fungi possess advantageous metabolic and ecophysiological features for remediation but are underexplored compared to bacteria. Additionally, indigenous fungi are more efficient at PAH detoxification than commercial/foreign counterparts and remediation strategies remain site-specific. Few studies have focused on hydrocarbonoclastic fungal incidence and potential in MVs, an aspect that has not been explored in Trinidad. This study determined the unique biodiversity of culturable fungi from the Marac MV capable of metabolizing PAHs in vitro and investigated their extracellular peroxidase activity to utilize different substrates ergo their extracellular oxidoreductase activity (> 50% of the strains decolourized of methylene blue dye). Dothideomycetes and Eurotiomycetes (89% combined incidence) were predominantly isolated. ITS rDNA sequence cluster analysis confirmed strain identities. 18 indigenous hydrocarbonoclastic strains not previously reported in the literature and some of which were biosurfactant-producing, were identified. Intra-strain variability was apparent for PAH utilization, oil-tolerance and hydroxylase substrate specificity. Comparatively high levels of extracellular protein were detected for strains that demonstrated low substrate specificity. Halotolerant strains were also recovered which indicated marine-mixed substrata of the MV as a result of deep sea conduits. This work highlighted novel MV fungal strains as potential bioremediators and biocatalysts with a broad industrial applications.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Biodiversity and biocatalyst activity of culturable hydrocarbonoclastic fungi isolated from Marac–Moruga mud volcano in South Trinidad

Ramdass

Rampersad

2021

Sci Rep

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“…These studies revealed that archaeal communities are mostly composed of methanogens and anaerobic methanotrophs (ANME), while bacterial communities are more diverse and consist of members of various phyla. Among them, sulfate-reducing bacteria, presumably originating from deep subsurface fluids, were found at various terrestrial mud volcano sites [14,[16][17][18]20]. Sulfate-reducers can form syntrophic consortia with anaerobic methanotrophic archaea (ANME) performing anaerobic oxidation of methane (AOM) [8,21].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sulfur and Methane-Oxidizing Microbial Community in a Terrestrial Mud Volcano Revealed by Metagenomics

et al. 2020

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Mud volcanoes are prominent geological structures where fluids and gases from the deep subsurface are discharged along a fracture network in tectonically active regions. Microbial communities responsible for sulfur and methane cycling and organic transformation in terrestrial mud volcanoes remain poorly characterized. Using a metagenomics approach, we analyzed the microbial community of bubbling fluids retrieved from an active mud volcano in eastern Crimea. The microbial community was dominated by chemolithoautotrophic Campylobacterota and Gammaproteobacteria, which are capable of sulfur oxidation coupled to aerobic and anaerobic respiration. Methane oxidation could be enabled by aerobic Methylococcales bacteria and anaerobic methanotrophic archaea (ANME), while methanogens were nearly absent. The ANME community was dominated by a novel species of Ca. Methanoperedenaceae that lacked nitrate reductase and probably couple methane oxidation to the reduction of metal oxides. Analysis of two Ca. Bathyarchaeota genomes revealed the lack of mcr genes and predicted that they could grow on fatty acids, sugars, and proteinaceous substrates performing fermentation. Thermophilic sulfate reducers indigenous to the deep subsurface, Thermodesulfovibrionales (Nitrospirae) and Ca. Desulforudis (Firmicutes), were found in minor amounts. Overall, the results obtained suggest that reduced compounds delivered from the deep subsurface support the development of autotrophic microorganisms using various electron acceptors for respiration.

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“…The 16S rRNA gene phylogeny ( Supplementary Figure S1a ) demonstrates that this microorganism is closely related to ANME-3 archaea detected in Haakon Mosby mud volcano, deep-sea sediments of Monterey Canyon, and some other habitats [ 3 , 4 , 79 ]. The mcrA gene of KA19 ( Supplementary Figure S1b ) phylogenetically belongs to «group f» cluster previously found to be associated with ANME-3 microorganisms [ 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 , 51 ,...…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Microbial communities inhabiting submarine mud volcanoes have been extensively studied due to the proposed significant environmental impact of these ecosystems on the global methane cycle [ 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 ]. Microorganisms of terrestrial mud volcanoes have been investigated to a relatively small extent, a number of TMVs located in the areas of mud volcanism in Romania, Italy, Azerbaijan, Taiwan, China, Trinidad and Russia were inspected in relation to microbial community composition and abundance [ 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 ]. Metagenomic approaches were applied to explore the prokaryotic diversity of TMV only recently [ 23 , 24 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Diversity and Metabolic Potential of the Terrestrial Mud Volcano Microbial Community with a High Abundance of Archaea Mediating the Anaerobic Oxidation of Methane

Merkel

Chernyh

Pimenov

et al. 2021

Life

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Terrestrial mud volcanoes (TMVs) are important natural sources of methane emission. The microorganisms inhabiting these environments remain largely unknown. We studied the phylogenetic composition and metabolic potential of the prokaryotic communities of TMVs located in the Taman Peninsula, Russia, using a metagenomic approach. One of the examined sites harbored a unique community with a high abundance of anaerobic methane-oxidizing archaea belonging to ANME-3 group (39% of all 16S rRNA gene reads). The high number of ANME-3 archaea was confirmed by qPCR, while the process of anaerobic methane oxidation was demonstrated by radioisotopic experiments. We recovered metagenome-assembled genomes (MAGs) of archaeal and bacterial community members and analyzed their metabolic capabilities. The ANME-3 MAG contained a complete set of genes for methanogenesis as well as of ribosomal RNA and did not encode proteins involved in dissimilatory nitrate or sulfate reduction. The presence of multiheme c-type cytochromes suggests that ANME-3 can couple methane oxidation with the reduction of metal oxides or with the interspecies electron transfer to a bacterial partner. The bacterial members of the community were mainly represented by autotrophic, nitrate-reducing, sulfur-oxidizing bacteria, as well as by fermentative microorganisms. This study extends the current knowledge of the phylogenetic and metabolic diversity of prokaryotes in TMVs and provides a first insight into the genomic features of ANME-3 archaea.

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A chemical and microbial characterization of selected mud volcanoes in Trinidad reveals pathogens introduced by surface water and rain water

Cited by 7 publications

References 62 publications

Biodiversity and biocatalyst activity of culturable hydrocarbonoclastic fungi isolated from Marac–Moruga mud volcano in South Trinidad

Biodiversity and biocatalyst activity of culturable hydrocarbonoclastic fungi isolated from Marac–Moruga mud volcano in South Trinidad

Sulfur and Methane-Oxidizing Microbial Community in a Terrestrial Mud Volcano Revealed by Metagenomics

Diversity and Metabolic Potential of the Terrestrial Mud Volcano Microbial Community with a High Abundance of Archaea Mediating the Anaerobic Oxidation of Methane

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