Culturable Microbial Diversity and the Impact of Tourism in Kartchner Caverns,Arizona |
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Authors: | Luisa A Ikner Rickard S Toomey Ginger Nolan Julia W Neilson Barry M Pryor Raina M Maier |
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Institution: | (1) Department of Soil, Water and Environmental Science, University of Arizona, 429 Shantz Building #38, Tucson, AZ 85721, USA;(2) Kartchner Caverns State Park, Benson, AZ 85602, USA;(3) Department of Plant Sciences, Division of Plant Pathology, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721, USA |
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Abstract: | Kartchner Caverns in Benson, AZ, was opened for tourism in 1999 after a careful development protocol that was designed to
maintain predevelopment conditions. As a part of an ongoing effort to determine the impact of humans on this limestone cave,
samples were collected from cave rock surfaces along the cave trail traveled daily by tour groups (200,000 visitors year–1) and compared to samples taken from areas designated as having medium (30–40 visitors year–1) and low (2–3 visitors year–1) levels of human exposure. Samples were also taken from fiberglass moldings installed during cave development. Culturable
bacteria were recovered from these samples and 90 unique isolates were identified by using 16S rRNA polymerase chain reaction
and sequencing. Diversity generally decreased as human impact increased leading to the isolation of 32, 27, and 22 strains
from the low, medium, and high impact areas, respectively. The degree of human impact was also reflected in the phylogeny
of the isolates recovered. Although most isolates fell into one of three phyla: Actinobacteria, Firmicutes, or Proteobacteria,
the Proteobacteria were most abundant along the cave trail (77% of the isolates), while Firmicutes predominated in the low
(66%) and medium (52%) impact areas. Although the abundance of Proteobacteria along the cave trail seems to include microbes
of environmental rather than of anthropogenic origin, it is likely that their presence is a consequence of increased organic
matter availability due to lint and other organics brought in by cave visitors. Monitoring of the cave is still in progress
to determine whether these bacterial community changes may impact the future development of cave formations. |
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