Hypolithic communities shape soils and organic matter reservoirs in the ice-free landscapes of East Antarctica.

The soils of East Antarctica have no rhizosphere with the bulk of organo-mineral interactions confined to the thin microbial and cryptogamic crusts that occur in open or cryptic niches and are collectively known as biological soil crust (BSC). Here we demonstrate that cryptic hypolithic varieties of BSC in the Larsemann Hills of East Antarctica contribute to the buildup of soil organic matter and produce several types of continuous organogenous horizons within the topsoil with documented clusters of at least 100 m. Such hypolithic horizons accumulate 0.

[Diversity and viability of prokaryotes in primitive soils of the larsemann oasis (East Antarctica)].

The diversity and viability of prokaryotic communities in the primitive organomineral soils of East Antarctica have been studied; it has been shown that the total number of bacteria is smaller than and the viability of bacteria is similar to that in soils of the temperate zone. The prokaryotic communities are characterized by the occurrence of a major part of cells in filterable forms, which is higher than the analogous parameter for the temperate soils. The method of fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) revealed that the distribution of the main taxons is similar to that in the temperate soils: the portion of the domain Archaea is smaller than that of the domain Bacteria; the total content of Gram-negative bacteria (the phyla Proteobacteria, Acidobacteria, and Planctomycetes) is higher than that of Gram-positive bacteria (Actinobacteria).