Sponge symbiotic bacterial communities Metagenome
Sponges (Porifera) attract researchers'' interest due to the ability to accumulate a wide variety of microorganisms, such as heterotrophic bacteria, cyanobacteria, microscopic algae, archaea, dinoflagellates, fungi, etc. within their body. For the first time, 454 pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA gene fragments was applied to the analysis of bacterial communities associated with freshwater sponges living in Lake Baikal, the most ancient and the deepest lake on the planet.