Metagenomics revealing molecular profiling of microbial community structure and metabolic capacity in Bamucuo, Tibet

We performed a survey of the microorganisms in Bamucuo, Tibet, resulting in 160,212 (soil) and 135,994 (water) contigs by shotgun metagenomic methods. We discovered 74 new bacterial species and reconstructed their draft genomes, which were obtained from the 75 reconstructed almost complete metagenomic assembly genomes (MAG) in the soil and water samples. Proteobacteria and Actinobacteria were found to be the most dominant bacterial phyla, while Euryarchaeota was the most dominant archaeal phylum. To our surprise, Pandoravirus salinus was found in the soil microbial community. We concluded that the microorganisms in Bamucuo fix carbon mainly through the 3-hydroxypropionic bi-cycle pathway.