Taxonomic and functional prokaryote diversity in mildly arsenic-contaminated sediments

Arsenic-resistant prokaryote diversity is far from being exhaustively explored. In this study, the arsenic-adapted prokaryotic community present in a moderately arsenic-contaminated site near Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines (France) was characterized, using metaproteomic and 16S rRNA-encoding gene amplification. High prokaryotic diversity was observed, with a majority of Proteobacteria, Acidobacteria and Bacteroidetes, and a large archaeal community comprising Euryarchaeaota and Thaumarchaeota. Metaproteomic analysis revealed that Proteobacteria, Planctomycetes and Cyanobacteria are among the active bacteria in this ecosystem. Taken together, these results highlight the unsuspected high diversity of the arsenic-adapted prokaryotic community, with some phyla never having been described in highly arsenic-exposed sites.