Subsurface microbial community structure shifts along the geological features of the Central American Volcanic Arc

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Authors

Marco Basili, Timothy J. Rogers, Mayuko Nakagawa, Mustafa Yücel, Joost M de Moor, Peter H. Barry, Matthew O Schrenk, Gerdhard L. Jessen, Sabin Zahirovic , David Bekaert, Carlos J Ramirez, Deborah Bastoni, Angelina Cordone, Karen G. Lloyd, Donato Giovannelli

Abstract

Subduction of the Cocos and Nazca oceanic plates beneath the Caribbean plate drives the upward movement of deep fluids enriched in carbon, nitrogen, sulfur, and iron along the Central American Volcanic Arc (CAVA). These compounds fuel diverse subsurface microbial communities that in turn alter the distribution, redox state, and isotopic composition of these compounds. Microbial community structure and functions vary according to deep fluid delivery across the arc, but less is known about how microbial communities differ along the axis of a convergent margin as geological features (e.g., extent of volcanism and subduction geometry) shift. Here, we investigate changes in bacterial 16S rRNA gene amplicons and geochemical analysis of deeply-sourced seeps along the southern CAVA, where subduction of the Cocos Ridge alters the geological setting. We find shifts in community composition along the convergent margin, with communities in similar geological settings clustering together independently of the proximity of sample sites. Microbial community composition correlates with geological variables such as host rock type, maturity of hydrothermal fluid and slab depth along different segments of the CAVA. This reveals tight coupling between deep Earth processes and subsurface microbial activity, controlling community distribution, structure and composition along a convergent margin.

DOI

https://doi.org/10.31223/X5HM55

Subjects

Biodiversity, Biogeochemistry, Earth Sciences, Environmental Microbiology and Microbial Ecology Life Sciences, Geochemistry, Geology, Microbiology, Volcanology

Keywords

Subduction zone, microbial diversity, subsurface ecosystem, geobiology, hydrothermal systems

Dates

Published: 2024-02-04 12:21

Last Updated: 2024-02-04 17:21

License

CC BY Attribution 4.0 International

Additional Metadata

Conflict of interest statement:
The authors declare no competing interests.

Data Availability (Reason not available):
All the sequences analyzed in this study are available through NCBI under project PRJNA797441 and ENA under project accession PRJEB63479. A complete R script containing all the steps to reproduce our analysis is available at https://github.com/giovannellilab/Basili_et_al_Central_America_Convergent_Margin with DOI https://zenodo.org/doi/10.5281/zenodo.10578391 together with all the environmental and geochemical data.