Canadian Forest Service Publications
Plant Litter Type Dictates Microbial Communities Responsible for Greenhouse Gas Production in Amended Lake Sediments. 2018. Yakimovich, K.M.; Emilson, E.J.S.; Carson, M.A.; Tanentzap, A.J.; Basiliko, N.; Mykytczuk, N.C.S. Frontiers in Microbiology 9: 2662.
Year: 2018
Issued by: Great Lakes Forestry Centre
Catalog ID: 39394
Language: English
Availability: PDF (download)
Available from the Journal's Web site. †
DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2018.02662.
† This site may require a fee
Plain Language Summary
The microbial communities of lake sediments play key roles in the cycling of carbon, linking lakes to both surrounding landscapes that are sources of organic inputs and to the global climate system via greenhouse gas emissions. Here, we amended lake sediments with three different plant leaf litters: a coniferous forest mix, deciduous forest mix, and cattails (Typha latifolia) and examined the community structure, and numbers of bacteria, fungi and, methanogens. We found polyphenol levels correlated with changes in the bacterial, methanogen, and fungal communities, most notably dominance of fungi over bacteria as polyphenol levels increased, which corresponded with increases of the white rot fungi Phlebia spp. Additionally, we saw a shift in the dominant orders of fermentative bacteria with increasing polyphenol levels, and differences in the dominant methanogen groups, with high CH4 production being more strongly associated with generalist groups of methanogens found at lower polyphenol levels. Our present study provides insights into, and basis for future study on how shifting forest and wetland plant communities may influence anaerobic microbial communities and processes in lake sediments, and may alter the fate of terrestrial carbon entering inland waters.
