Abstract
Phytoplankton blooms are natural phenomena in the ocean, which are the results of rapid cell growth of some phytoplankton species in a unique environment. However, little is known about the molecular events occurring during the bloom. Here, we compared metaproteomes of two phytoplankton Heterosigma akashiwo and Prorocentrum donghaiense in the coastal East China Sea. H. akashiwo and P. donghaiense accounted for 7.82% and 4.74% of the phytoplankton community protein abundances in the non-bloom sample, whereas they contributed to 60.13% and 78.09% in their individual blooming samples. Compared with P. donghaiense, H. akashiwopossessed significantly higher abundance of light-harvesting complex proteins, carbonic anhydrase and RuBisCO. The blooming H. akashiwo cells expressed more proteins related to external nutrient acquisition, such as bicarbonate transporter SLC4, ammonium transporter, nitrite transporter and alkaline phosphatase, while the blooming P. donghaiense cells highly expressed proteins related to extra- and intracellular organic nutrient utilization, such as amino acid transporter, 5′-nucleotidase, acid phosphatase and tripeptidyl-peptidase. The strong capabilities of light harvesting, as well as acquisition and assimilation of inorganic carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus facilitated the formation of the H. akashiwo bloom under the high turbidity and inorganic nutrient sufficient condition, whereas the competitive advantages in organic nutrient acquisition and reallocation guaranteed the occurrence of the P. donghaiensebloom under the inorganic nutrient insufficient condition. This study highlights the powerfulness of metaproteomics for revealing the underlying molecular behaviors of different co-existing phytoplankton species, and advances our knowledge on the formation of phytoplankton blooms.
Link to the full text: https://aem.asm.org/content/early/2019/07/29/AEM.01425-19.long
