DRP005275
Airborne microbial communities at high-altitude and suburban sites in Toyama, Japan suggest a new perspective for bioprospecting
This study was conducted to compare the composition and abundance of airborne microorganisms at a high-altitude site, Mt. Jodo (2,839 m above mean sea level (AMSL)) and a suburban site (23 m AMSL) in Toyama, Japan. To our knowledge, this is the first study to investigate airborne microbial communities in air samples collected simultaneously from high-altitude and suburban sites in a small area. Air samples were collected at five time points from 2009 to 2011 during late summer to early autumn. We then examined the bacterial and eukaryotic communities using Illumina MiSeq sequencing of the 16S and 18S rRNA gene hypervariable regions and estimated the abundance of bacteria and fungi with real-time TaqMan PCR.