Study unveils the compositions and origins of global airborne bacteria on Earth

Ingrid Fadelli is a writer for the website Phys.org.

Microbiomes can include both beneficial and harmful organisms. Understanding how destructive microbiomes originate in changing environments could help to tackle global well-being challenges more effectively.

Researchers at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University and institutions and universities in China and the U.S. have recently carried out a study into the composition and origins of airborne (i.e., transported in the air) microbiomes. Humans and animals are the primary sources of global airbornebacteria according to their findings.

The researchers spent nine years on the study, including drafting the initial proposal, conducting sampling across the world, collecting and processing data, and drafting and revising the manuscript. We believe that airbornebacteria will attract more and more attention from all sectors of society after establishing a comprehensive atlas of global airbornebacteria with implications for ecology, air pollution, and public health.

Li and his colleagues obtained 76 new air samples and organized them into a dataset for their atlas of global airbornebacteria. They combined the data with the air samples from the scientific studies to cover 63 places around the world.

The samples were collected at a wide range of locations, from rooftops in urban areas to high mountain tops. They wanted to be able to identify the biogeographic distribution of airbornebacteria, such as the environments associated with different types ofbacteria.

Li said that one of the most interesting findings was the maximum microbial diversity of microorganisms in intermediate latitudinal regions.

Li and his colleagues found that places with the broadest range of existing airborne microbiomes are in the middle of the latitudinal regions. It would make sense, as these regions are known to be associated with richer flora and more diversity of organisms.

The study shows that human activities have had a greater impact on the community in comparison to the background and pristine air environments in Tibet. The structure of the microbiomes in the ambient air has changed due to human activity. We need to advocate for the protection of natural environments.

The researchers estimated that the richness ofbacteria in the atmosphere is comparable to the richness ofbacteria in the hydroosphere.

Li said that with the rapid development of biotechnology, we can now see more of the global microbial world and gradually break through the limitations of traditional biological observations. We recommend that more microbiologic knowledge be covered in future textbooks to help the public understand more about the invisible microbial world on the Earth.

Many people have become more aware of how the air on Earth can promote the rapid transmission of harmful microbiomes after the COVID-19 Pandemic. The recent work by this team of researchers sheds light on the distribution of these invisible and yet widely impactful organisms.

The mechanisms behind the geographical distribution of different microbiomes were the focus of a recent study by Li and his colleagues. They were unable to explore the processes underpinning the evolution of the microbiomes due to the fact that they were only able to collect samples for one year.

Changing environmental conditions drive evolutionary processes that drive biogeography. Future systematic sampling work with a longer period of around 10 years should be conducted to achieve a comprehensive understanding of mechanisms.

In the future, the findings gathered by this team of researchers could inspire the development of strategies to increase the number of flora and fauna. The library they compiled could be used by other environmental scientists to assess the effects of humans on the environment.

We are going to investigate the function of the metabolically activebacterial community with respect to their function in the atmosphere and impacts on human health.

We intend to expand the scope of airborne microbiomes to enrich the research field of bioaerosols and atmospheric science in relation to human health as well as contributing to expanding the frontiers of understanding of the Earth.

Jue Zhao et al., Global airborne bacterial community--Interactions with Earth's microbiomes and anthropogenic activities, was published in the National Academy of Sciences. 10.1073/pnas.

Journal information: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

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