Comparative Shotgun Metagenomics of Microbial Communities Associated with Two Geothermal Systems in Kazakhstan.
4 affiliations
- 1Department of Chemical and Biological Technologies, K. Turysov Institute of Geology and Oil and Gas Engineering, Satbayev University, 22 Satpaev Street, Almaty 050013, Kazakhstan.
- 2Department of Biotechnology, Faculty of Biology and Biotechnology, Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, Al-Farabi 71, Almaty 050038, Kazakhstan.
- 3Department of Botany and Agroecology, Faculty of Biology and Biotechnology, Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, Al-Farabi 71, Almaty 050038, Kazakhstan.
- 4Computational Biology, International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology, ICGEB, 34149 Trieste, Italy.
Abstract
Geothermal-associated microbial communities remain poorly characterized in Central Asia. Here, shotgun metagenomics was used to compare microbial communities associated with thermally influenced substrates from the Chundzha and Rakhman geothermal systems in Kazakhstan. Six metagenomes representing three spatial replicates per site yielded approximately 6.5-7.3 Gb of clean sequence data per sample. Species-level richness showed a directional trend toward higher values in Chundzha, whereas Shannon diversity was similar between sites. Genus-level Bray-Curtis ordination showed apparent site-associated separation, with sampling site explaining 87.3% of the variation, although the effect was not statistically significant (PERMANOVA, R² = 0.873, p = 0.10). Chundzha showed greater relative representation of several halophilic and halotolerant taxa, whereas Rakhman showed greater representation of soil-associated lineages. Broad COG and KEGG functional profiles were largely shared between sites. Several hydrogenase-, nitrogenase-, and RuBisCO-associated genes showed higher relative representation in Rakhman, whereas selected fermentation- and photosynthesis-associated functions were relatively higher in Chundzha; however, none of the targeted KO comparisons remained significant after FDR correction. These results indicate candidate taxonomic and functional patterns that should be regarded as exploratory because of the limited replication. The dataset provides a baseline for future genome-resolved and metatranscriptomic studies of geothermal-associated microbial communities in Kazakhstan.
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BibTeX
@article{kakimova2026comparative,
title = {{Comparative Shotgun Metagenomics of Microbial Communities Associated with Two Geothermal Systems in Kazakhstan.}},
author = {Ardak B Kakimova and Yelena G Zaparina and Bolatkhan K Zayadan and Sandugash K Sandybayeva and Dinara Kelden and Aliyam A Dauletova and Silvano Piazza},
journal = {Biology},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.3390/biology15191704},
url = {https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42883377},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Comparative Shotgun Metagenomics of Microbial Communities Associated with Two Geothermal Systems in Kazakhstan.
AU - Ardak B Kakimova
AU - Yelena G Zaparina
AU - Bolatkhan K Zayadan
AU - Sandugash K Sandybayeva
AU - Dinara Kelden
AU - Aliyam A Dauletova
AU - Silvano Piazza
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/24
JO - Biology
DO - 10.3390/biology15191704
UR - https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42883377
AB - Geothermal-associated microbial communities remain poorly characterized in Central Asia. Here, shotgun metagenomics was used to compare microbial communities associated with thermally influenced substrates from the Chundzha and Rakhman geothermal systems in Kazakhstan. Six metagenomes representing three spatial replicates per site yielded approximately 6.5-7.3 Gb of clean sequence data per sample. Species-level richness showed a directional trend toward higher values in Chundzha, whereas Shannon diversity was similar between sites. Genus-level Bray-Curtis ordination showed apparent site-associated separation, with sampling site explaining 87.3% of the variation, although the effect was not statistically significant (PERMANOVA, R² = 0.873, p = 0.10). Chundzha showed greater relative representation of several halophilic and halotolerant taxa, whereas Rakhman showed greater representation of soil-associated lineages. Broad COG and KEGG functional profiles were largely shared between sites. Several hydrogenase-, nitrogenase-, and RuBisCO-associated genes showed higher relative representation in Rakhman, whereas selected fermentation- and photosynthesis-associated functions were relatively higher in Chundzha; however, none of the targeted KO comparisons remained significant after FDR correction. These results indicate candidate taxonomic and functional patterns that should be regarded as exploratory because of the limited replication. The dataset provides a baseline for future genome-resolved and metatranscriptomic studies of geothermal-associated microbial communities in Kazakhstan.
SN - 2079-7737
ER -