Protist communities of microbial mats from the extreme environments of five saline Andean lagoons at high altitudes in the Atacama Desert

DiscussionWe found a restricted overlap of the protist community between the different microbial mats indicating the uniqueness of these different aquatic habitats. On the other hand, the dominating genotypes present in metabarcoding were similar and could be isolated and sequenced in comparative studies (Rhogostoma, Euplotes, Neobodo). Our results provide a snapshot of the unculturable protist diversity thriving the benthic zone of five athalossohaline lagoons across the Andean plateau.
Source: Frontiers in Microbiology - Category: Microbiology Source Type: research