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<div class=Section1>
<p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:18.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>Ocean's
microbiome has incredible diversity – and human likeness<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>by<span
class=apple-converted-space><span style='color:black'> </span></span><a
href="http://www.newscientist.com/search?rbauthors=Colin+Barras"><b><span
style='color:#34A3D1;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>Colin Barras</span></b></a><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>21
May 2015<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn27578?cmpid=NLC|NSNS|2015-0528-GLOBAL&utm_medium=NLC&utm_source=NSNS#.VWdwINJViko<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:black'><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse align=center style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;
margin-bottom:0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:center;
line-height:13.45pt'><span style='border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'><a
href="http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn27578/dn27578-1_1200.jpg"><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#34A3D1;
text-decoration:none'><img border=0 width=1200 height=800 id="Imagen_x0020_1"
src="cid:image001.jpg@01D09955.F4A183C0"
alt="http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn27578/dn27578-1_1200.jpg"></span></a></span><i><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black;border:
none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>Plankton collected by the Tara expedition in
the Pacific Ocean with a 0.1 mm mesh net: a mixture of multicellular organisms
and single-cell protists<span class=apple-converted-space> </span></span></i><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>(Image:
Christian Sardet/CNRS/Tara Expéditions)<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>We're a step closer to
understanding the microbial community that inhabits the ocean – and it
has some striking similarities to the community that lives inside our guts. The
microbiome of the world's biggest ecosystem and one of the smallest appear to
function in surprisingly similar ways.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>Microscopic plankton produce a
large proportion of the oxygen in the atmosphere – amounting to half of
all oxygen produced by photosynthesis – but we know very little about
these organisms. The data collected by researchers aboard the schooner Tara
will change that. Between 2009 and 2013, the ship sailed the world's seas and
oceans, collecting 35,000 plankton samples – both microbial and
multicellular – from the upper layers of the water.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>The first batch of the Tara
studies is published today, and it reveals that planktonic marine life is far
more diverse than anyone expected. For example, we already knew of about 4350
species of microalgae, 1350 species of protists and 5500 species of tiny
animals, based on direct studies of their appearance. But the new genetic
evidence suggests that there are probably three to eight times as many distinct
species in each group as currently recognised.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal style='background:#2E3641'><b><span style='font-size:8.0pt;
font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif";color:#454545'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></p>
<table class=MsoNormalTable border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=0 width="100%"
style='width:100.0%'>
<tr id="zd_tr_26817">
<td style='padding:0in 0in 0in 0in;opacity: 1' id="zd_td_26817"></td>
</tr>
</table>
<div style='mso-element:para-border-div;border:none;border-bottom:solid #00759A 1.0pt;
padding:0in 0in 0in 0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-right:15.0pt'>
<h3 style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;
margin-left:0in;line-height:14.8pt;border:none;padding:0in'><span
style='font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>40 million genes<o:p></o:p></span></h3>
</div>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'><a
href="http://www.embl.de/research/units/scb/bork/members/index.php?s_personId=CP-60011932"><span
style='color:#34A3D1;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>Shinichi
Sunagawa</span></a><span class=apple-converted-space> </span>at the
European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg, Germany, and his
colleagues used the genetic samples from the Tara voyage to create the Ocean
Microbial Reference Gene Catalogue. It contains over 40 million genes from more
than 35,000 species.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse align=center style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;
margin-bottom:0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:center;
line-height:13.45pt'><span style='border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'><a
href="http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn27578/dn27578-2_1200.jpg"><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#34A3D1;
text-decoration:none'><img border=0 width=1200 height=800 id="Imagen_x0020_3"
src="cid:image002.jpg@01D09955.F4A183C0"
alt="http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn27578/dn27578-2_1200.jpg"></span></a></span><i><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black;border:
none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>This male</span></i><span
class=apple-converted-space><span style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:black'> </span></span><span style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:black'>Sapphirina<span class=apple-converted-space> </span><i><span
style='border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>copepod collected in the
Mediterranean sea reflects and diffracts light through tiny plates in the cells
on its surface</span></i><span class=apple-converted-space> </span>(Image:
Christian Sardet/CNRS/Sharif Mirshak/Parafilms/Tara Expedition)<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>They then used the catalogue to
establish the core genetic features of the global ocean microbiome. That core
turned out to be relatively small: the researchers considered only the subset
of genes found in every one of the 139 ocean microbe samples they studied, and
those genes fell into just 5755 gene families.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>Only one
other microbiome – that<span class=apple-converted-space> </span><a
href="http://www.newscientist.com/special/microbiome"><span style='color:#34A3D1;
border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>of the human gut</span></a><span
class=apple-converted-space> </span>– is known in a comparable level
of detail. The two clearly occupy very different environments: the gut lacks
oxygen, for example, and has a stable temperature, while shallow ocean water is
aerobic and fluctuates in temperature.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>Even so, the genetic studies show
there is a significant overlap in the way the two microbiomes function.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>In both, there was an almost
identical abundance of genes involved in replication, ion transport and cell
motility.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>"This certainly was rather a
big surprise to us because we expected different ecosystems would have
microbial communities with functions that would be completely different,"
Sunagawa said at a press conference this week.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<div style='mso-element:para-border-div;border:none;border-bottom:solid #00759A 1.0pt;
padding:0in 0in 0in 0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-right:15.0pt'>
<h3 style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:7.5pt;
margin-left:0in;line-height:14.8pt;border:none;padding:0in'><span
style='font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"'>Universal features<o:p></o:p></span></h3>
</div>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>It is too early to say if the
similarities are coincidental or are characteristics shared by all microbiomes.
But the results hint that microbial systems in general may behave in a similar
way regardless of exactly what environment they occupy; something that other
researchers could now begin to test, Sunagawa says.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse align=center style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;
margin-bottom:0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-bottom:.0001pt;text-align:center;
line-height:13.45pt'><span style='border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'><a
href="http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn27578/dn27578-3_1200.jpg"><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#34A3D1;
text-decoration:none'><img border=0 width=1200 height=1033 id="Imagen_x0020_4"
src="cid:image003.jpg@01D09955.F4A183C0"
alt="http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn27578/dn27578-3_1200.jpg"></span></a></span><i><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black;border:
none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>A parasitoid crustacean of the</span></i><span
class=apple-converted-space><span style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:black'> </span></span><span style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";
color:black'>Phronima<span class=apple-converted-space> </span><i><span
style='border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>genus. It eats salps, another
type of plankton, and uses their empty husks as protective shells</span></i><span
class=apple-converted-space> </span>(Image: M.Ormestad/Kahikai/Tara
Oceans)<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>There were some differences,
though: genes involved in defence mechanisms and carbohydrate transport were
present in both microbiomes, but were more abundant in the human gut. Also,
genes involved in energy production - including photosynthesis - were present
in both but were more abundant in the ocean.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
0in;margin-left:7.5pt;margin-bottom:.0001pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span
style='font-size:9.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'><a
href="http://www.afns.ualberta.ca/StaffProfiles/AcademicProfiles/Walter..aspx"><span
style='color:#34A3D1;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>Jens Walter</span></a><span
class=apple-converted-space> </span>at the University of Alberta in
Edmonton, Canada – who was involved in a recent analysis of the<span
class=apple-converted-space> </span><a
href="http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn27381-is-superdiverse-amazon-microbiome-something-to-strive-for.html"><span
style='color:#34A3D1;border:none windowtext 1.0pt;padding:0in'>unusual microbiome
of hunter-gatherers</span></a><span class=apple-converted-space> </span>in
the remote Venezuelan rainforest – says it is not surprising that two
very different microbiomes would function in broadly similar ways.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>This is because the fundamental
way in which many microbes function has not changed much during their
evolution, and it is the functions they do not share with others that helps
define the ecology of any given microbiome, Walter says.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>For instance, all forms of E.
coli bacteria function in an essentially similar way, but some are benign and
some are pathogens. "The first live in the gut of healthy people, and the
latter kill you," he says.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=infuse style='mso-margin-top-alt:0in;margin-right:15.0pt;margin-bottom:
15.0pt;margin-left:7.5pt;line-height:13.45pt'><span style='font-size:9.5pt;
font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:black'>Future Tara studies should
hopefully give a more detailed picture of these differences – as well as
revealing more about how the ocean's microbial community might be affected by
climate change.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p>
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