Bacterial metabolic functional diversity in Holocene permafrost metagenomes of Svalbard
The mechanisms for functional microbial metabolism in perennially frozen soil in the Arctic region hold good potential for an understanding of the response of microbial communities to a thawing of permafrost. A rise in temperature above freezing is unusual in this region, these initiate processes for the degradation of permafrost ground, by decomposition of complex organic matter in soil trapped for many years, which results in a release of greenhouse gases like methane, nitrous oxide, and carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, thus increasing overall global warming frequency. The permafrost cores in this study are taken at a depth of 135cms drilled core in Adventdalen valley located in the Svalbard region of the Arctic, these cores were investigated for their microbial community structure and functional potential using high-throughput shotgun metagenomic sequencing. The dominant phylum found were Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Proteobacteria, Firmicutes, Chloroflexi and Acidobacteria also Verrucomicrobia and Euryarchaeota were present in low abundance. Based on protein sequences salient metabolic potentials were observed in permafrost which revealed active nitrogen and sulfur metabolism, and antibiotic biosynthesis, as functional traits which reveal different processes occurring in this frozen habitat. From this study, we tend to add a new approach to the dynamic nature of permafrost microbiomes and their potential in the regulation of metabolic pathways