Cycling of volatile organic compounds by marine bacterial isolates.

Understanding the dynamics of marine compounds that influence atmospheric chemistry, such as volatile organic compounds (VOCs) is crucial to future climate predictions. This hinges on a better constrain of VOCs cycling and underlying mechanisms of regulation. Marine microbes are key drivers of the dynamics of the marine organic carbon pool including the volatile fraction, however, their contribution to VOC cycling is still poorly defined. Here, we studied the cycling of different VOCs by marine bacterial isolates from various phylogenetic groups and environments (temperate and polar). Bacterial growth, VOC production and utilization were followed in pure cultures and synthetic communities, using VOCs and their precursors as sole carbon sources. Preliminary results show isolates with different preferences for these compounds and different trace elements requirements, suggesting niche partitioning of bacterial taxa cycling VOCs. This will be further assessed by analysis of the isolates genomes. These results will bring new insights into the contribution of marine bacteria to carbon cycling and atmospheric chemistry.