EAPSI: Investigating the Distribution and Diversity of Anaerobic Ammonium Oxidizing Bacteria in a Geothermal Hot Spring Ecosystem

本项目将调查位于新西兰北岛的地热温泉生态系统中厌氧氨氧化（anammox）细菌的丰度，分布和功能能力。厌氧氨氧化细菌在去除活性氮（即，氮物种（直接或间接支持生长的氮物种），但它们在去除地热温泉生态系统中的活性氮方面的作用尚不清楚。对厌氧氨氧化细菌的了解在今天特别有价值，因为世界上大多数工业化国家都在努力管理淡水和海水中活性氮浓度升高。通过该项目获得的对厌氧氨氧化细菌分布和多样性的深入了解将有助于科学家和工程师开发和应用更强大和可持续的活性脱氮工艺。该项目将与新西兰奥克兰大学环境微生物学和生物技术方面的著名专家庄伟勤博士合作进行。 地热温泉生态系统样本将从千泉数据库中收集，该数据库已对从新西兰北岛陶波火山区收集的1,000多个地热温泉生态系统样本的16 S rRNA微生物多样性和相关地球化学条件进行了编目。这个数据库将被挖掘，以确定样本，表明厌氧氨氧化细菌的存在。将对这些样品进行进一步分析，以阐明这些样品中厌氧氨氧化细菌的丰度和功能能力。将通过定量聚合酶链反应分析来确定抗体，并通过宏基因组分析来确定功能能力。随后，将对从庄实验室运营的地热温泉富集生物反应器中提取的样品进行相同的分析，以了解极端厌氧氨氧化细菌从自然生态系统转化为工程生物反应器的影响。该奖项根据东亚和太平洋夏季研究所计划，支持美国研究生的暑期研究，由NSF和新西兰皇家学会共同资助。

This project will investigate the abundance, distribution, and functional capabilities of anaerobic ammonium oxidizing (anammox) bacteria in a geothermal hot spring ecosystem located on the North Island of New Zealand. Anammox bacteria play an important role in removing reactive nitrogen (i.e., nitrogen species that directly or indirectly support growth) from both natural and engineered ecosystems, but their role in removing reactive nitrogen from geothermal hot spring ecosystems is not well understood. Increased knowledge of anammox bacteria is particularly valuable today, because most of the world's industrialized nations are struggling to manage elevated concentrations of reactive nitrogen in their fresh and marine water bodies. The insights into the distribution and diversity of anammox bacteria gained as a result of this project will help scientists and engineers develop and apply more robust and sustainable reactive nitrogen removal processes. This project will be conducted in collaboration with Dr. Wei-Qin Zhuang, a noted expert in environmental microbiology and biotechnology, at the University of Auckland in New Zealand. Geothermal hot spring ecosystem samples will be collected from the One Thousand Springs database, which has catalogued the 16S rRNA microbial diversity and associated geochemical conditions of over 1,000 geothermal hot spring ecosystem samples collected from the Taupo Volcanic Zone on New Zealand's North Island. This database will be mined to identify samples that indicate the existence of anammox bacteria. Further analyses will be performed on these samples to elucidate the abundance and functional capabilities of anammox bacteria within these samples. Abundance will be determined through quantitative polymerase chain reaction analyses, and functional capabilities will be determined through metagenomic analyses. Subsequently, these same analyses will be performed on samples extracted from geothermal hot spring enrichment bioreactors operated by the Zhuang Laboratory, in order to understand the impacts of the translation of extremophilic anammox bacteria from a natural ecosystem to an engineered bioreactor.This award, under the East Asia and Pacific Summer Institutes program, supports summer research by a U.S. graduate student and is jointly funded by NSF and the Royal Society of New Zealand.