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Comparison of wintertime eukaryotic community from sea ice and open water in the Baltic Sea, based on sequencing of the 18S rRNA gene

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Abstract

The Baltic Sea is one of the world’s largest brackish water basins and is traditionally considered to be species poor. Here, we assessed the diversity of the nano-sized eukaryotic microbial wintertime community, using molecular ecological methods based on sequencing of small-subunit ribosomal RNA gene clone libraries. The results demonstrate that a rich community of small eukaryotes inhabits the Baltic Sea ice and water during winter. The community was dominated by alveolates and stramenopiles. Ciliates and cercozoans were the richest groups present, while in contrast to previous studies, diatoms showed a lower richness than expected. Furthermore, fungi and parasitic Syndiniales were present both in the water and in the sea ice. Some of the organisms in the sea-ice community were active, based on the RNA data, but a number of organisms were inactive or remnants from the freezing process. The results demonstrate that the sea-ice communities in the Baltic Sea are highly diverse and that water and ice of different ages include different protistan assemblages. Our study emphasizes the potential loss in biodiversity through diminishing ice cover as a result of climate change.

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Acknowledgments

The Walter and Andrée de Nottbeck Foundation provided financial support for M.M. and J.-M.R and the Emil Aaltonen Foundation for M.P. and J.B. This work was supported by a grant from the Academy of Finland to D.P.F (1212943). We would like to thank Jonna Piiparinen for help in the ice sampling at Tvärminne Zoological Station and Vilma Rouvinen for her assistance in the preparations before and during the cruise to the Gulf of Bothnia. We owe our greatest gratitude to Prof. Klaus Jürgens who invited J.-M.R. to participate in the maiden voyage of the research vessel Maria S. Merian. This article is part of the Ph.D. thesis of M.M.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Tvärminne Zoological Station, University of Helsinki, J.A. Palménin tie 260, 10900, Hanko, Finland

    Markus Majaneva & Janne-Markus Rintala

  2. Finnish Environmental Institute, Marine Centre, Erik Palménin aukio 1, P.O. Box 140, 00251, Helsinki, Finland

    Markus Majaneva & Janne-Markus Rintala

  3. Department of Environmental Sciences, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 65, 00014, Helsinki, Finland

    Markus Majaneva, Janne-Markus Rintala, Maria Piisilä & Jaanika Blomster

  4. Department of Food and Environmental Sciences, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 66, 00014, Helsinki, Finland

    David P. Fewer

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  1. Markus Majaneva
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Correspondence to Jaanika Blomster.

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Majaneva, M., Rintala, JM., Piisilä, M. et al. Comparison of wintertime eukaryotic community from sea ice and open water in the Baltic Sea, based on sequencing of the 18S rRNA gene. Polar Biol 35, 875–889 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00300-011-1132-9

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