While toxins from aquatic cyanobacteria are a well-recognised cause of disease in birds and animals, exposure of grazing livestock to terrestrial cyanobacteria has not been described. This study identified terrestrial cyanobacteria, predominantly Phormidium spp., in the biofilm of plants from most livestock fields investigated. Lower numbers of other cyanobacteria, microalgae and fungi were pre...

We compared the community structures of cyanobacteria in four biological desert crusts from Utah's Colorado Plateau developing on different substrata. We analyzed natural samples, cultures, and cyanobacterial filaments or colonies retrieved by micromanipulation from field samples using microscopy, denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis, and sequencing of 16S rRNA genes. While microscopic analy...

Cyanobacteria are photosynthetic prokaryotes found in a range of environments. They are infamous for the production of toxins, as well as bioactive compounds, which exhibit anticancer, antimicrobial and protease inhibition activities. Cyanobacteria produce a broad range of antifungals belonging to structural classes, such as peptides, polyketides and alkaloids. Here, we tested cyanobacteria fro...

Cyanobacteria are prominent constituents of the marine biosphere that account for a significant percentage of oceanic primary productivity. In an effort to resolve how open-ocean cyanobacteria persist in regions where the Fe concentration is thought to be limiting their productivity, we performed a number of Fe stress experiments on axenic cultures of marine Synechococcus spp., Crocosphaera sp....

Suspended particles and particle aggregates, which formed from concentrated field samples on the roller table, were characterized biologically and chemically along a transect through the Baltic Sea in summer 1999. Phytoplankton composition in field samples was dominated by cyanobacteria, including the filamentous diazotrophic cyanobacteria Aphanizomenon ‘ baltica’, Nodularia spumigena and Anaba...

Bacteria associated with the Eastern oysters (Crassostrea virginica) native to Apalachicola Bay, FL, were investigated using 16S rRNA gene amplicon metagenomic sequencing which revealed that the oyster microbiome was predominated by Cyanobacteria and Proteobacteria. We also found that the oyster tissues were predominated by the pathogenic and symbiotic Photobacterium spp. (formerly known as Vib...

The Guadiana estuary, located between Portugal and Spain, has the fourth largest drainage basin of Iberian river systems. Up to 75% of the catchment area has been regulated by dams since the early 1970s. During the 1980s and 1990s, an increasing occurrence of summer cyanobacteria blooms dominated by the potentially toxic Microcystis spp. was reported. In an effort to understand the causes of re...

Cyanobacterial blooms are of great importance because of the toxic effects that these microorganisms are able to induce, particularly on aquatic organisms. Microcystins (MCs) are the principal toxins biosynthesized by cyanobacteria and are powerful inhibitors of the protein phosphatases 1 and 2A. Zooplankton filter feeders such as cladocerans are directly affected by MCs as a result of ingestio...