Global distribution patterns of marine nitrogen-fixers by imaging and molecular methods

• Nitrogen fixation has a critical role in marine primary production, yet our understanding of marine nitrogen-fixers (diazotrophs) is hindered by limited observations. Here, we report a quantitative image analysis pipeline combined with mapping of molecular markers for mining >2,000,000 images and >1300 metagenomes from surface, deep chlorophyll maximum and mesopelagic seawater samples across 6 size fractions (<0.2-2000m). We use this approach to characterise the diversity, abundance, biovolume and distribution of symbiotic, colony-forming and particle-associated diazotrophs at a global scale. We show that imaging and PCR-free molecular data are congruent. Sequence reads indicate diazotrophs are detected from the ultrasmall bacterioplankton (<0.2m) to mesoplankton (180-2000 mu m) communities, while images predict numerous symbiotic and colony-forming diazotrophs (>20 mu m). Using imaging and molecular data, we estimate that polyploidy can substantially affect gene abundances of symbiotic versus colony-forming diazotrophs. Our results support the canonical view that larger diazotrophs (>10 mu m) dominate the tropical belts, while unicellular cyanobacterial and non-cyanobacterial diazotrophs are globally distributed in surface and mesopelagic layers. We describe co-occurring diazotrophic lineages of different lifestyles and identify high-density regions of diazotrophs in the global ocean. Overall, we provide an update of marine diazotroph biogeographical diversity and present a new bioimaging-bioinformatic workflow. Nitrogen fixation by diazotrophs is critical for marine primary production. Using Tara Oceans datasets, this study combines a quantitative image analysis pipeline with metagenomic mining to provide an improved global overview of diazotroph abundance, diversity and distribution.

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NATURVETENSKAP  -- Biologi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Biological Sciences (hsv//eng)

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