Survey of the microbial communities residing on the seamounts of the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument
The Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, located northwest of the Hawaiian Islands, contains the Wentworth Seamounts and the recently mapped Liliuokalani Ridge Seamounts, ancient undersea volcanoes. To integrate our understanding of what roles microbial life plays in these systems, a survey of rock and bottom water samples was collected in order to characterize these deep-sea microbial communities. DNA was extracted from rocks and from bottom water samples near the seamounts collected with CTD Niskin bottles. Microbial biomass was assessed with flow cytometric cell counting and quantitative PCR. Community diversity was evaluated by analyzing Amplicon Sequence Variants (ASVs) amplified from the V4-V5 region of the 16s rRNA genes of the DNA extracts.