TY  - JOUR
A1  - Corno, Gianluca
A1  - Salka, Ivette
A1  - Pohlmann, Kirsten
A1  - Hall, Alex R.
A1  - Grossart, Hans-Peter
T1  - Interspecific interactions drive chitin and cellulose degradation by aquatic microorganisms
JF  - Aquatic microbial ecology : international journal
N2  - Complex biopolymers (BPs) such as chitin and cellulose provide the majority of organic carbon in aquatic ecosystems, but the mechanisms by which communities of bacteria in natural systems exploit them are unclear. Previous degradation experiments in artificial systems predominantly used microcosms containing a single bacterial species, neglecting effects of interspecific interactions. By constructing simplified aquatic microbial communities, we tested how the addition of other bacterial species, of a nanoflagellate protist capable of consuming bacteria, or of both, affect utilization of BPs. Surprisingly, total abundance of resident bacteria in mixed communities increased upon addition of the protist. Concomitantly, bacteria shifted from free-living to aggregated morphotypes that seemed to promote utilization of BPs. In our model system, these interactions significantly increased productivity in terms of overall bacterial numbers and carbon transfer efficiency. This indicates that interactions on microbial aggregates may be crucial for chitin and cellulose degradation. We therefore suggest that interspecific microbial interactions must be considered when attempting to model the turnover of the vast pool of complex biopolymers in aquatic ecosystems.
KW  - Aggregation
KW  - Flagellate grazing
KW  - Ecological interactions
KW  - Microbial carbon transfer
KW  - Polymer degradation
KW  - System ecology
Y1  - 2015
U6  - https://doi.org/10.3354/ame01765
SN  - 0948-3055
SN  - 1616-1564
VL  - 76
IS  - 1
SP  - 27
EP  - +
PB  - Institute of Mathematical Statistics
CY  - Oldendorf Luhe
ER  -