Conspicuous Smooth and White Egg-Shaped Sulfur Structures on a Deep-Sea Hydrothermal Vent Formed by Sulfide-Oxidizing Bacteria

Abstract

At the deep-sea Guaymas Basin hydrothermal vent system, sulfide-rich hydrothermal fluids mix with oxygenated seawater, thereby providing a habitat for microbial sulfur oxidation. Microbial sulfur oxidation in the deep sea involves a variety of organisms and processes and can result in the excretion of elemental sulfur.

Metagenomic 16S rDNA reads of in situ preserved samples revealed microbial communities in the Yongle blue hole

“…In the present study, 16S miTags were used to reveal the prokaryotic community structure in the water column inside the YBH. The relatives of the main OTUs of Desulfatiglandales, Thiomicrospirales, Campylobacterales and Alteromonadales are sulfur-reducing bacteria ( Desulfatiglans ) ( Cifuentes et al, 2021 ; Li et al, 2021 ; Xu et al, 2022 ), sulfur-oxidizing bacteria ( Thiomicrorhabdus , Arcobacter ) ( Magnuson et al, 2021 ; Scott et al, 2018 ; van Erk et al, 2021 ), and Alteromonas , which confirms the metabolic potentials using their classification against SILVA database at order level ( Fig. 5 ).…”

“…However, Alteromonas can probably grow rapidly when a stronger electron acceptor, oxygen, is available during water filtration onboard under a higher temperature ( Bowman & McMeekin, 2015 ). In previous studies, Arcobacter species belonging to this family occupied the dominant position in the anoxic water column of YBH at depths of 100–150 m ( He et al, 2020 ; Zhang et al, 2021 ) and they have been reported to be able to participate in sulfur cycling as a sulfur oxidizer ( Callbeck et al, 2019 ; van Erk et al, 2021 ). However, sulfur oxidation mainly occurs in the oxic layer or the hypoxic layer, and the anoxic layer mainly performs sulfate reduction and denitrification ( He et al, 2019 ).…”