Bacterial Diversity of Freshwater Alpine Lake Puma Yumco on the Tibetan Plateau

Abstract

Bacterial community in the water of Lake Puma Yumco, a freshwater alpine lake on the Tibetan Plateau was studied for the first time using an integrated approach including water chemistry and culture-dependent and -independent methods. Microbial abundance in the lake water was from 1.59 × 10⁵ to 3.37 × 10⁵ cells mL^{− 1}, and bacteria were evenly distributed in the lake due to its uniform water physical-chemistry. Obtained isolates were affiliated with α-, β- and γ-Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria and Bacteroidetes, among which γ-Proteobacteria isolates were dominant. Retrieved bacterial 16S rRNA gene clones fell into α-, β- and γ-Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Cyanobacteria, Planctomycetes, Verrucomicrobia and Chloroflexi. Bacterial diversity in Lake Puma Yumco was higher than that in other Tibetan lakes at levels of both phyla and clusters. A half of total clones in Lake Puma Yumco were members of the widespread typical freshwater bacterial clusters. The low temperature of Lake Puma Yumco also made it possess unique freshwater bacteria members.

Keywords:

• bacterial diversity
• Lake Puma Yumco
• Tibetan Plateau

This work was supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology of the People's Republic of China (Grant No. 2005CB422004) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 40671044). We thank Dr. John Hodgkiss for improving English.