<i>In situ</i> associations between marine photosynthetic picoeukaryotes and potential parasites – a role for fungi?

Lepère, Cécile; Ostrowski, Martin; Hartmann, Manuela; Zubkov, Mikhail V.; Scanlan, David J.

doi:10.1111/1758-2229.12339

Cited by 26 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…The high number of chytrids in sea ice relative to seawater is consistent with other sequencing-based studies from the Arctic (8). Furthermore, the presence of the Chytridiomycota in the water column has been confirmed in other global marine ecosystems with CARD-FISH methods (50) and in the Arctic with sequencing data (6).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 86%

Arctic marine fungi: biomass, functional genes, and putative ecological roles

Hassett¹,

Borrego

Vonnahme³

et al. 2019

The ISME Journal

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Recent molecular evidence suggests a global-distribution of marine fungi; however, the ecological relevance and corresponding biological contributions of fungi to marine ecosystems remains largely unknown. We assessed fungal biomass from the open Arctic Ocean by applying novel biomass conversion factors from cultured-isolates to environmental sterol and CARD-FISH data. We found an average of 16.54 nmol m -3 of ergosterol in sea ice and seawater, which corresponds to 1.74 mg C m -3 (444.56 mg C m -2 in seawater). Using Chytridiomycota-specific probes, we observed freeliving and particulate-attached cells that averaged 34.07 µg C m -3 in sea ice and seawater (11.66 mg C m -2 in seawater). Summed CARD-FISH and ergosterol values approximate 1.77 mg C m -3 in sea ice and seawater (456.23 mg C m -2 in seawater), which is similar to biomass estimates of other marine taxa generally considered integral to marine food webs and ecosystem processes. Using the GeoChip microarray, we detected evidence for fungal viruses within the Partitiviridae in sediment, as well as fungal genes involved in the degradation of biomass and the assimilation of nitrate. To bridge our observations of fungi on particulate and the detection of degradative genes, we germinated fungal conidia in zooplankton fecal pellets and grew fungal conidia after eight months incubation in sterile seawater. Ultimately, these data suggest that fungi could be as important in oceanic ecosystems as they are in freshwater environments. Significance Statement:The oceans cover 71% of the world's surface; however, the contributions of marine fungi to these environments remain a gap to understanding marine ecosystem processes and associated biogeochemical cycling. Here we provide the first biomass estimates of fungi from the Arctic Ocean, supplemented with a functional gene inventory, and experiment-based ecological data demonstrating putative niches occupied by fungi in the marine environment. We provide evidence that marine fungi comprise a comparable quantity of biomass relative to other taxonomic groups that are generally considered to be essential ecosystem components.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 86%

Arctic marine fungi: biomass, functional genes, and putative ecological roles

Hassett¹,

Borrego

Vonnahme³

et al. 2019

The ISME Journal

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“…Compared with environmental studies there were also several other protist lineages that were underrepresented in PIDA. Fungi, for example, have been shown to be diverse in environmental HTS surveys of several aquatic environments [57][58][59] and some of these have been proposed as important parasites of protists [60,61]. Judging from the scant number of entries in PIDA and the relatively broad host ranges that these organisms had, we suggest that future investigations should focus on revealing more about the ecological function of aquatic fungi.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

The planktonic protist interactome: where do we stand after a century of research?

et al. 2019

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Microbial interactions are crucial for Earth ecosystem function, but our knowledge about them is limited and has so far mainly existed as scattered records. Here, we have surveyed the literature involving planktonic protist interactions and gathered the information in a manually curated Protist Interaction DAtabase (PIDA). In total, we have registered~2500 ecological interactions from~500 publications, spanning the last 150 years. All major protistan lineages were involved in interactions as hosts, symbionts (mutualists and commensalists), parasites, predators, and/or prey. Predation was the most common interaction (39% of all records), followed by symbiosis (29%), parasitism (18%), and 'unresolved interactions' (14%, where it is uncertain whether the interaction is beneficial or antagonistic). Using bipartite networks, we found that protist predators seem to be 'multivorous' while parasite-host and symbiont-host interactions appear to have moderate degrees of specialization. The SAR supergroup (i.e., Stramenopiles, Alveolata, and Rhizaria) heavily dominated PIDA, and comparisons against a global-ocean molecular survey (TARA Oceans) indicated that several SAR lineages, which are abundant and diverse in the marine realm, were underrepresented among the recorded interactions. Despite historical biases, our work not only unveils large-scale eco-evolutionary trends in the protist interactome, but it also constitutes an expandable resource to investigate protist interactions and to test hypotheses deriving from omics tools.

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“…Compared to environmental studies there were also several other protist lineages that were underrepresented in PIDA. Fungi, for example, have been shown to be diverse in environmental HTS surveys of several aquatic environments 34,35 and some of these have been proposed as important parasites of protists 36,37 . Judging from the scant number of entries in PIDA and the relatively broad host ranges that these organisms had, we suggest that future investigations should focus attention on revealing more about the ecological function of aquatic fungi.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The planktonic protist interactome: where do we stand after a century of research?

Bjorbækmo

Evenstad

Røsæg

et al. 2019

Preprint

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Microbial interactions are crucial for Earth ecosystem function, yet our knowledge about them is limited and has so far mainly existed as scattered records. Here, we have surveyed the literature involving planktonic protist interactions and gathered the information in a manually curated Protist Interaction DAtabase (PIDA). In total, we have registered ~2,500 ecological interactions from ~500 publications, spanning the last 150 years. All major protistan lineages were involved in interactions as hosts, symbionts, parasites, predators and/or prey. Symbiosis was the most common interaction (43% of all records), followed by predation (39%) and parasitism (18%). Using bipartite networks, we found that protistan predators seem to be "multivorous", while parasite-host and symbiont-host interactions appear to have moderate degrees of specialization. The SAR supergroup (i.e. Stramenopiles, Alveolata and Rhizaria) heavily dominated PIDA, and comparisons against a global-ocean molecular survey (TARA Oceans) indicated that several SAR lineages, which are abundant and diverse in the marine realm, were underrepresented among the compiled interactions. All in all, despite historical biases, our work not only unveils large-scale eco-evolutionary trends in the protist interactome, but it also constitutes an expandable resource to investigate protist interactions and to test hypotheses deriving from omics tools.

show abstract

In situ associations between marine photosynthetic picoeukaryotes and potential parasites – a role for fungi?

Cited by 26 publications

References 42 publications

Arctic marine fungi: biomass, functional genes, and putative ecological roles

Arctic marine fungi: biomass, functional genes, and putative ecological roles

The planktonic protist interactome: where do we stand after a century of research?

The planktonic protist interactome: where do we stand after a century of research?

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