Rapid analysis of photoautotroph microbial communities in soils by flow cytometric barcoding and fingerprinting

The investigations of soil microbiota and soil interactions are more and more significant from several points of view, including climate studies, environmental or human health. As a rapid cultivation-independent technique to study the alterations in soil photoautotroph microbial community structures flow cytometry was tested in soil-water suspensions prepared from the fresh soil of different crop cultures. Flow cytometric data were analyzed with barcoding and fingerprinting approaches to study the soil algal (<30 µm) community structure based on chlorophyll-a and phycoerythrin autofluorescence. Both statistical approaches revealed larger differences between crop cultures than within, indicating that both methods have potential in studying the dynamic changes of soil microalgal community structures.