Spatio-temporal diversity of biological aerosols over Northeast India: a metagenomic approach

• Published in: Environmental science and pollution research international Vol. 29; no. 42; pp. 64096 - 64111
• Main Authors: Pathak, Binita, Khataniar, Ankita, Das, Barlin, Upadhyaya, Sristisri, Medhi, Ankita, Bhuyan, Pradip Kumar, Buragohain, Alak Kumar, Borah, Debajit
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01-09-2022; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Aerosols; Aerosols - analysis; Aquatic Pollution; Atmospheric Protection/Air Quality Control/Air Pollution; Bacilli; Bacteria; Bacteria - genetics; Bioaerosols; Biodiversity; Biodiversity hot spots; Debris; Deoxyribonucleic acid; DNA; Earth and Environmental Science; Ecotoxicology; Environment; Environmental Chemistry; Environmental Health; Environmental Monitoring; Environmental science; Fungi; Geographical distribution; India; Metagenome; Metagenomics; Microorganisms; Monsoons; Particulate Matter; Research Article; Seasons; Spatial distribution; Spores; Temporal distribution; Thorax; Waste Water Technology; Water Management; Water Pollution Control; Wind; India; Bioaerosol characterization; Air quality; Human health; Bacterial diversity; Metagenome analysis
• ISSN: 0944-1344; 1614-7499
• DOI: 10.1007/s11356-022-20323-w

Northeast India is considered as one of the major biodiversity hotspots in the world, but the region is underexplored for their microbial biodiversity. Extensive characterization of biological aerosol (bioaerosol) samples collected from various locations of Northeast India was carried out for all four seasons in a year. These were characterized in terms of their constituents, such as pollens, fungal spores, animal debris, and non-biological components, and particulate matters, such as inhalable, thoracic, and alveolic, and finally, the bacterial diversity was determined by DNA-based metagenomic approach. The non-biological (non-viable) component of aerosols is found to vary from 30 to 89% in the pre-monsoon season, which coexists with pollens (4–20%), animal debris (1–24%), and fungal spores (1–17%). The highest number of culturable microbial populations in terms of CFU count was observed in the pre-monsoon samples (i.e., 125.24–632.45 CFU/m
3
), and the lowest CFU was observed in monsoon season (i.e., 20.83–319.0 CFU/m
3
). The metagenomic approach with the samples collected during pre-monsoon season showed a total of bacterial 184 OTUs (operational taxonomic units) with 28,028 abundance count comprising 7 major phylum, 6 classes, 10 orders, 15 families, 13 genus, and 8 species of bacteria. The species-level distribution clearly shows the presence of Gammaproteobacteria (52%) most abundantly, followed by Bacilli (21%), Alphaproteobacteria (14%), Betaproteobacteria (5%), Flavobacteria (5%), and Sphingobacteria (3%). It is the first report from the entire Northeast India to uncover spatio-temporal distribution of biological components and bacterial diversity in aerosol samples through a DNA-based metagenomic approach.
Graphical abstract