Bacterial community composition and diversity in Kalakuli, an alpine glacial-fed lake in Muztagh Ata of the westernmost Tibetan Plateau

Abstract

It is widely accepted that bacterial community composition and diversity in remote alpine lakes are structured by environmental conditions such as nutrient status and temperature. However, the mechanisms that underlie and structure bacterial community composition and diversity in alpine lakes remain unclear. We used 16S rRNA gene-based Illumina MiSeq sequencing to investigate the complex ecological interactions between bacterial communities and nutrient status in Kalakuli Lake, an alpine glacial-fed lake in Muztagh Ata of the westernmost Tibetan Plateau. Our results indicated that the bacterial community was dominated by the Actinobacteria and Proteobacteria. The results of threshold estimates showed that there were apparent shifts in dominance from the Proteobacteria to Actinobacteria groups associated with increasing carbon to nitrogen (C:N) ratio, and the change points were 6.794 and 2.448, respectively. Using multiple statistical methods, we found that the abiotic factors of dissolved organic carbon and total nitrogen had substantial impacts on bacterial diversity, while bacterial community compositions were significantly correlated with both the biotic element of bacterial abundance and the abiotic ones, temperature and pH. These findings demonstrated that the C:N ratio played a significant role in shifting dominant bacterial assemblages in the Kalakuli watershed and provided evidence of nutrients affecting bacterial community composition and diversity. We argue that this study could further shed light on how climate change-induced glacial retreat may impact bacterial communities in glacial-fed lakes under future global warming scenarios.