Similarity of Bacterial Community Structure between Asian Dust and Its Sources Determined by rRNA Gene-Targeted Approaches

Abstract

The atmospheric movement of arid soil can play an important role in the movement of microorganisms attached to soil microparticles. Bacterial community structures in Asian dust collected at Beijing were investigated using the 16S rRNA gene sequence and compared to those in arid soil, a possible source of the dust. Asian dust samples contained 2.5×10⁷ to 3.5×10⁹ copies of the 16S rRNA gene gram^-1. Therefore, more than 10¹³ bacterial cells (km)^-2 per month were estimated to arrive in Beijing via Asian dust. Terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis revealed that the bacterial community structures in Asian dust samples differed greatly according to the scale of the dust event. The bacterial communities from major dust events were similar to those from an arid region of China.