Measuring the effect of climate change in Antarctic microbial communities: toward novel experimental approaches.

The Antarctic continent is undergoing a rapid warming, affecting microbial communities throughout its ecosystems. This continent is a natural laboratory for studying the effect of climate change, however, assessing the microbial communities' responses to environmental changes is challenging from a methodological point of view. We suggest novel experimental designs, including multivariable assessments that apply multiomics methods in combination with continuous environmental data recording and new warming simulation systems. Moreover, we propose that climate change studies in Antarctica should consider three main objectives, including descriptive studies, short-term temporary adaptation studies, and long-term adaptive evolution studies. This will help us to understand and manage the effects of climate change on the Earth.

Unraveling a Lignocellulose-Decomposing Bacterial Consortium from Soil Associated with Dry Sugarcane Straw by Genomic-Centered Metagenomics.

Second-generation biofuel production is in high demand, but lignocellulosic biomass' complexity impairs its use due to the vast diversity of enzymes necessary to execute the complete saccharification. In nature, lignocellulose can be rapidly deconstructed due to the division of biochemical labor effectuated in bacterial communities. Here, we analyzed the lignocellulolytic potential of a bacterial consortium obtained from soil and dry straw leftover from a sugarcane milling plant. This consortium was cultivated for 20 weeks in aerobic conditions using sugarcane bagasse as a sole carbon source. Scanning electron microscopy and chemical analyses registered modification of the sugarcane fiber's appearance and biochemical composition, indicating that this consortium can deconstruct cellulose and hemicellulose but no lignin. A total of 52 metagenome-assembled genomes from eight bacterial classes (Actinobacteria, Alphaproteobacteria, Bacilli, Bacteroidia, Cytophagia, Gammaproteobacteria, Oligoflexia, and Thermoleophilia) were recovered from the consortium, in which ~46% of species showed no relevant modification in their abundance during the 20 weeks of cultivation, suggesting a mostly stable consortium. Their CAZymes repertoire indicated that many of the most abundant species are known to deconstruct lignin (e.g., Chryseobacterium) and carry sequences related to hemicellulose and cellulose deconstruction (e.g., Chitinophaga, Niastella, Niabella, and Siphonobacter). Taken together, our results unraveled the bacterial diversity, enzymatic potential, and effectiveness of this lignocellulose-decomposing bacterial consortium.

Database limitations for studying the human gut microbiome.

BACKGROUND: In the last twenty years, new methodologies have made possible the gathering of large amounts of data concerning the genetic information and metabolic functions associated to the human gut microbiome. In spite of that, processing all this data available might not be the simplest of tasks, which could result in an excess of information awaiting proper annotation. This assessment intended on evaluating how well respected databases could describe a mock human gut microbiome. METHODS: In this work, we critically evaluate the output of the cross-reference between the Uniprot Knowledge Base (Uniprot KB) and the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes Orthologs (KEGG Orthologs) or the evolutionary genealogy of genes: Non-supervised Orthologous groups (EggNOG) databases regarding a list of species that were previously found in the human gut microbiome. RESULTS: From a list which contemplates 131 species and 52 genera, 53 species and 40 genera had corresponding entries for KEGG Database and 82 species and 47 genera had corresponding entries for EggNOG Database. Moreover, we present the KEGG Orthologs (KOs) and EggNOG Orthologs (NOGs) entries associated to the search as their distribution over species and genera and lists of functions that appeared in many species or genera, the "core" functions of the human gut microbiome. We also present the relative abundance of KOs and NOGs throughout phyla and genera. Lastly, we expose a variance found between searches with different arguments on the database entries. Inferring functionality based on cross-referencing UniProt and KEGG or EggNOG can be lackluster due to the low number of annotated species in Uniprot and due to the lower number of functions affiliated to the majority of these species. Additionally, the EggNOG database showed greater performance for a cross-search with Uniprot about a mock human gut microbiome. Notwithstanding, efforts targeting cultivation, single-cell sequencing or the reconstruction of high-quality metagenome-assembled genomes (MAG) and their annotation are needed to allow the use of these databases for inferring functionality in human gut microbiome studies.

pime: A package for discovery of novel differences among microbial communities.

The data used for profiling microbial communities is usually sparse with some microbes having high abundance in a few samples and being nearly absent in others. However, current bioinformatics tools able to deal with this sparsity are lacking. pime (Prevalence Interval for Microbiome Evaluation) was designed to remove those taxa that may be high in relative abundance in just a few samples but have a low prevalence overall. The reliability and robustness of pime were compared against existing methods and tested using 16S rRNA independent data sets. pime filters microbial taxa not shared in a per treatment prevalence interval started at 5% prevalence with increasing increments of 5% at each filtering step. For each prevalence interval, hundreds of decision trees were calculated to predict the likelihood of detecting differences in treatments. The best prevalence-filtered data set was user-selected by choosing the prevalence interval that kept a large portion of the 16S rRNA sequences in the data set while also showing the lowest error rate. To obtain the likelihood of introducing type I error while building prevalence-filtered data sets, an error detection step based was also included. A pime reanalysis of published data sets uncovered other expected microbial associations than previously reported, which may be masked when only relative abundance was considered.

Genomic signatures and co-occurrence patterns of the ultra-small Saccharimonadia (phylum CPR/Patescibacteria) suggest a symbiotic lifestyle.

The size of bacterial genomes is often associated with organismal metabolic capabilities determining ecological breadth and lifestyle. The recently proposed Candidate Phyla Radiation (CPR)/Patescibacteria encompasses mostly unculturable bacterial taxa with relatively small genome sizes with potential for co-metabolism interdependencies. As yet, little is known about the ecology and evolution of CPR, particularly with respect to how they might interact with other taxa. Here, we reconstructed two novel genomes (namely, Candidatus Saccharibacter sossegus and Candidatus Chaer renensis) of taxa belonging to the class Saccharimonadia within the CPR/Patescibacteria using metagenomes obtained from acid mine drainage (AMD). By testing the hypothesis of genome streamlining or symbiotic lifestyle, our results revealed clear signatures of gene losses in these genomes, such as those associated with de novo biosynthesis of essential amino acids, nucleotides, fatty acids and cofactors. In addition, co-occurrence analysis provided evidence supporting potential symbioses of these organisms with Hydrotalea sp. in the AMD system. Together, our findings provide a better understanding of the ecology and evolution of CPR/Patescibacteria and highlight the importance of genome reconstruction for studying metabolic interdependencies between unculturable Saccharimonadia representatives.

Moisture Is More Important than Temperature for Assembly of Both Potentially Active and Whole Prokaryotic Communities in Subtropical Grassland.

Moisture and temperature play important roles in the assembly and functioning of prokaryotic communities in soil. However, how moisture and temperature regulate the function of niche- versus neutral-based processes during the assembly of these communities has not been examined considering both the total microbial community and the sole active portion with potential for growth in native subtropical grassland. We set up a well-controlled microcosm-based experiment to investigate the individual and combined effects of moisture and temperature on soil prokaryotic communities by simulating subtropical seasons in grassland. The prokaryotic populations with potential for growth and the total prokaryotic community were assessed by 16S rRNA transcript and 16S rRNA gene analyses, respectively. Moisture was the major factor influencing community diversity and structure, with a considerable effect of this factor on the total community. The prokaryotic populations with potential for growth and the total communities were influenced by the same assembly rules, with the niche-based mechanism being more influential in communities under dry condition. Our results provide new information regarding moisture and temperature in microbial communities of soil and elucidate how coexisting prokaryotic populations, under different physiological statuses, are shaped in native subtropical grassland soil.

BTW-Bioinformatics Through Windows: an easy-to-install package to analyze marker gene data.

Recent advances in Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) make comparative analyses of the composition and diversity of whole microbial communities possible at a far greater depth than ever before. This brings new challenges, such as an increased dependence on computation to process these huge datasets. The demand on system resources usually requires migrating from Windows to Linux-based operating systems and prior familiarity with command-line interfaces. To overcome this barrier, we developed a fully automated and easy-to-install package as well as a complete, easy-to-follow pipeline for microbial metataxonomic analysis operating in the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL)-Bioinformatics Through Windows (BTW). BTW combines several open-access tools for processing marker gene data, including 16S rRNA, bringing the user from raw sequencing reads to diversity-related conclusions. It includes data quality filtering, clustering, taxonomic assignment and further statistical analyses, directly in WSL, avoiding the prior need of migrating from Windows to Linux. BTW is expected to boost the use of NGS amplicon data by facilitating rapid access to a set of bioinformatics tools for Windows users. Moreover, several Linux command line tools became more reachable, which will enhance bioinformatics accessibility to a wider range of researchers and practitioners in the life sciences and medicine. BTW is available in GitHub (https://github.com/vpylro/BTW). The package is freely available for noncommercial users.

Draft genome of Nocardia farcinica TRH1, a linear and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon-degrading bacterium isolated from the coast of Trindade Island, Brazil

Abstract Here, we report the draft genome sequence and annotation of Nocardia farcinica TRH1, a petroleum hydrocarbons degrading Actinobacteria isolated from the coastal water of Trindade Island, Brazil.

Draft genome of Nocardia farcinica TRH1, a linear and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon-degrading bacterium isolated from the coast of Trindade Island, Brazil.

Here, we report the draft genome sequence and annotation of Nocardia farcinica TRH1, a petroleum hydrocarbons degrading Actinobacteria isolated from the coastal water of Trindade Island, Brazil.

BMPOS: a Flexible and User-Friendly Tool Sets for Microbiome Studies.

Recent advances in science and technology are leading to a revision and re-orientation of methodologies, addressing old and current issues under a new perspective. Advances in next generation sequencing (NGS) are allowing comparative analysis of the abundance and diversity of whole microbial communities, generating a large amount of data and findings at a systems level. The current limitation for biologists has been the increasing demand for computational power and training required for processing of NGS data. Here, we describe the deployment of the Brazilian Microbiome Project Operating System (BMPOS), a flexible and user-friendly Linux distribution dedicated to microbiome studies. The Brazilian Microbiome Project (BMP) has developed data analyses pipelines for metagenomic studies (phylogenetic marker genes), conducted using the two main high-throughput sequencing platforms (Ion Torrent and Illumina MiSeq). The BMPOS is freely available and possesses the entire requirement of bioinformatics packages and databases to perform all the pipelines suggested by the BMP team. The BMPOS may be used as a bootable live USB stick or installed in any computer with at least 1 GHz CPU and 512 MB RAM, independent of the operating system previously installed. The BMPOS has proved to be effective for sequences processing, sequences clustering, alignment, taxonomic annotation, statistical analysis, and plotting of metagenomic data. The BMPOS has been used during several metagenomic analyses courses, being valuable as a tool for training, and an excellent starting point to anyone interested in performing metagenomic studies. The BMPOS and its documentation are available at http://www.brmicrobiome.org .

Draft Genome of Rhodococcus rhodochrous TRN7, Isolated from the Coast of Trindade Island, Brazil.

Here, we present a draft genome and annotation of Rhodococcus rhodochrous TRN7, isolated from Trindade Island, Brazil, which will provide genetic data to benefit the understanding of its metabolism.

Draft Genome Sequence of "Acidibacillus ferrooxidans" ITV01, a Novel Acidophilic Firmicute Isolated from a Chalcopyrite Mine Drainage Site in Brazil.

Here, we report the draft genome sequence of "Acidibacillus ferrooxidans" strain ITV01, a ferrous iron- and sulfide-mineral-oxidizing, obligate heterotrophic, and acidophilic bacterium affiliated with the phylum Firmicutes. Strain ITV01 was isolated from neutral drainage from a low-grade chalcopyrite from a mine in northern Brazil.

Data analysis for 16S microbial profiling from different benchtop sequencing platforms.

Progress in microbial ecology is confounded by problems when evaluating results from different sequencing methodologies. Contrary to existing expectations, here we demonstrate that the same biological conclusion is reached using different NGS technologies when stringent sequence quality filtering and accurate clustering algorithms are applied.