Dual thermal ecotypes detected within a nearly genetically-identical population of the unicellular marine cyanobacterium *Synechococcus*
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- Published on: May 27 2020
- Source: BioRxiv
The extent and ecological significance of intraspecific diversity within marine microbial populations is still poorly understood, and it remains unclear if such strain-level microdiversity will affect fitness and persistence in a rapidly changing ocean environment. In this study, we cultured 11 sympatric strains of the ubiquitous marine picocyanobacterium Synechococcus isolated from a Narragansett Bay (Rhode Island, USA) phytoplankton community thermal selection experiment.
Despite all 11 isolates being highly similar (with average nucleotide identities of >99.9%, with 98.6-100% of the genome aligning), thermal performance curves revealed selection at warm and cool temperatures had subdivided the initial population into thermotypes with pronounced differences in maximum growth temperatures. Within the fine-scale genetic diversity that did exist within this population, the two divergent thermal ecotypes differed at a locus containing genes for the phycobilisome antenna complex.
Our study demonstrates that present-day marine microbial populations can contain microdiversity in the form of cryptic but environmentally-relevant thermotypes that may increase their resilience to future rising temperatures.
