An evaluation of glass beads from the southwestern coastal state of Goa, India, as a potential pollutant in marine ecosystem.

Glass beads laid on the road, mainly used for better visibility, can contribute to harmful anthropogenic waste to the marine environment, and it is a prerequisite to distinguish the chemical properties associated with it. This is the first systematic approach and evaluation of the toxic and non-toxic characteristics of the glass beads from the Indian coastal region (Goa state), which originated from the wearing of road paint over a period. Glass beads ranging from a few hundred to ~ 1000 µm were found on various beaches far from the roadside throughout the coastal state.

Biogeochemistry and ecology of from the Central Arabian Sea.

Background: A swarm of pelagic tunicate () was found in the surface open waters of the Arabian Sea during late southwest monsoon (September 2007). The swarm site was characterized by moderate southwesterly wind (approximately 7 m s), relatively low sea-surface temperature (approximately 26°C), shallow mixed layer (approximately 50 m), and substantial macro-nutrient concentrations (surface values: 2.5 μM nitrate, 0.

Fungal diversity from various marine habitats deduced through culture-independent studies.

Studies on the molecular diversity of the micro-eukaryotic community have shown that fungi occupy a central position in a large number of marine habitats. Environmental surveys using molecular tools have shown the presence of fungi from a large number of marine habitats such as deep-sea habitats, pelagic waters, coastal regions, hydrothermal vent ecosystem, anoxic habitats, and ice-cold regions. This is of interest to a variety of research disciplines like ecology, evolution, biogeochemistry, and biotechnology.

Manganese oxidation by bacteria: biogeochemical aspects.

Manganese is an essential trace metal that is not as readily oxidizable like iron. Several bacterial groups posses the ability to oxidize Mn effectively competing with chemical oxidation. The oxides of Mn are the strongest of the oxidants, next to oxygen in the aquatic environment and therefore control the fate of several elements.

Fungal diversity in oxygen-depleted regions of the Arabian Sea revealed by targeted environmental sequencing combined with cultivation.

In order to study fungal diversity in oxygen minimum zones of the Arabian Sea, we analyzed 1440 cloned small subunit rRNA gene (18S rRNA gene) sequences obtained from environmental samples using three different PCR primer sets. Restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) analyses yielded 549 distinct RFLP patterns, 268 of which could be assigned to fungi (Dikarya and zygomycetes) after sequence analyses. The remaining 281 RFLP patterns represented a variety of nonfungal taxa, even when using putatively fungal-specific primers.

Anaerobic denitrification in fungi from the coastal marine sediments off Goa, India.

Denitrification is a microbial process during which nitrate or nitrite is reduced under anaerobic condition to gaseous nitrogen. The Arabian Sea contains one of the major pelagic denitrification zones and in addition to this, denitrification also takes places along the continental shelf. Prokaryotic microorganisms were considered to be the only players in this process.