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Diversity of crude oil-degrading bacteria and alkane hydroxylase (alkB) genes from the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau

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Abstract

The aim of this study was to survey the response of the microbial community to crude oil and the diversity of alkane hydroxylase (alkB) genes in soil samples from the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (QTP). The enrichment cultures and clone libraries were used. Finally, 53 isolates and 94 alkB sequences were obtained from 10 pristine soil samples after enrichment at 10 °C with crude oil as sole carbon source. The isolates fell into the phyla Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria, and Bacteroidetes, with the dominance of Pseudomonas and Acinetobacter. The composition of degraders was different from polar habitats where Acinetobacter sp. is not a predominant responder of alkane degradative microbial communities. Phylogenetic analysis showed that the alkB genes from isolates and enrichment communities formed eight clusters and mainly related with alkB genes of Pseudomonas, Rhodococcus, and Acinetobacter. The alkB gene diversity in the QTP was lower than marine environments and polar soil samples. In particular, a total of 10 isolates exhibiting vigorous growth with crude oil could detect no crude oil degradation-related gene sequences, such as alkB, P450, almA, ndoB, and xylE genes. The Shannon-Wiener index of the alkB clone libraries from the QTP ranged from 1.00 to 2.24 which is similar with polar pristine soil samples but lower than that of contaminated soils. These results indicated that the Pseudomonas, Acinetobacter, and Rhodococcus genera are the candidate for in situ bioremediation, and the environment of QTP may be still relatively uncontaminated by crude oil.

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Acknowledgements

This work was funded by the International Scientific and Technological Cooperation Projects of the Ministry of Science and Technology (2014DFA30330), the National Science Foundation of China (41271265), and the International Scientific and Technological Cooperation Projects of Gansu Province (1304wcga173).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Bioscience and Bioengineering, Jiangxi Agricultural University, Nanchang, Jiangxi, 330045, China

    Haozhi Long, Yilin Wang & Guanghua Huo

  2. Key Laboratory of Desert and Desertification, Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou, Gansu, 730000, China

    Haozhi Long, Guangxiu Liu, Wei Zhang, Xiukun Wu, Xisheng Tai, Likun Sun & Baogui Zhang

  3. Key Laboratory of Extreme Environmental Microbial Resources and Engineering, Lanzhou, Gansu, 730000, China

    Haozhi Long, Sijing Chang, Guangxiu Liu, Tuo Chen, Wei Zhang, Xiukun Wu, Xisheng Tai, Likun Sun & Baogui Zhang

  4. State Key Laboratory of Cryospheric Sciences, Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou, Gansu, 730000, China

    Sijing Chang & Tuo Chen

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  1. Haozhi Long
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  2. Yilin Wang
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  4. Guangxiu Liu
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Correspondence to Guangxiu Liu or Tuo Chen.

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Long, H., Wang, Y., Chang, S. et al. Diversity of crude oil-degrading bacteria and alkane hydroxylase (alkB) genes from the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Environ Monit Assess 189, 116 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-017-5798-5

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