Bacteriophage are viruses of bacteria, and recent evidence is that they are hugely abundant and diverse in nature. This biocomplexity project is studying the composition and diversity of bacteriophage communities in solar salterns by high throughput DNA sequencing. The sequencing includes the complete genomes of cultured phage and partial shotgun sequencing of entire phage communities. Since phage genomes are ~50X smaller than those of prokaryotes, similar coverage of the phage community genome is being obtained with much less sequencing. Additionally, by focusing on lower diversity saltern systems, this project is obtaining high genomic coverage of the phage community from numerous samples. This approach will allow the research team to measure bacterial and phage diversity on a community level and determine if diversity changes as phage and host concentrations increase. The sequencing efforts are being combined with microarray methods, microbial ecology measurements (e.g., production and decay rates), and microscopy to investigate the types, concentration, distribution, and colonization of particles that contribute to spatial and temporal heterogeneity.
The resulting data on diversity, dynamics, and environmental parameters are being used to model phage-host dynamics across other ecosystems. Bioinformatic analyses of the data are also being used to address questions in phage taxonomy and genomics. Tools for analyzing and disseminating sequence data, as well as for mathematically modeling populations based on shotgun sequencing data are being developed. This project is producing robust bioinformatic, genomic, and mathematical tools that are applicable for assessing uncultured phage diversity in any ecosystem. This work is being made accessible to the public through several outreach programs and will also contribute to the education of K-12, undergraduate, and graduate students.
