Phylogenetically and catabolically diverse diazotrophs reside in deep-sea cold seep sediments

Xiyang Dong (), Chuwen Zhang, Yongyi Peng, Hong-Xi Zhang, Ling-Dong Shi, Guangshan Wei, Casey R. J. Hubert, Yong Wang () and Chris Greening
Additional contact information
Xiyang Dong: Ministry of Natural Resources
Chuwen Zhang: Ministry of Natural Resources
Yongyi Peng: Ministry of Natural Resources
Hong-Xi Zhang: Tsinghua University, University Town
Ling-Dong Shi: Zhejiang University
Guangshan Wei: Ministry of Natural Resources
Casey R. J. Hubert: University of Calgary
Yong Wang: Tsinghua University, University Town
Chris Greening: Biomedicine Discovery Institute

Nature Communications, 2022, vol. 13, issue 1, 1-14

Abstract: Abstract Microbially mediated nitrogen cycling in carbon-dominated cold seep environments remains poorly understood. So far anaerobic methanotrophic archaea (ANME-2) and their sulfate-reducing bacterial partners (SEEP-SRB1 clade) have been identified as diazotrophs in deep sea cold seep sediments. However, it is unclear whether other microbial groups can perform nitrogen fixation in such ecosystems. To fill this gap, we analyzed 61 metagenomes, 1428 metagenome-assembled genomes, and six metatranscriptomes derived from 11 globally distributed cold seeps. These sediments contain phylogenetically diverse nitrogenase genes corresponding to an expanded diversity of diazotrophic lineages. Diverse catabolic pathways were predicted to provide ATP for nitrogen fixation, suggesting diazotrophy in cold seeps is not necessarily associated with sulfate-dependent anaerobic oxidation of methane. Nitrogen fixation genes among various diazotrophic groups in cold seeps were inferred to be genetically mobile and subject to purifying selection. Our findings extend the capacity for diazotrophy to five candidate phyla (Altarchaeia, Omnitrophota, FCPU426, Caldatribacteriota and UBA6262), and suggest that cold seep diazotrophs might contribute substantially to the global nitrogen balance.

Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-32503-w Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:13:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-022-32503-w

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-32503-w

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().