List of size fractionated eukaryotic plankton community samples and associated metadata (Database W1)

The present data set provides an Excel file in a zip archive. The file lists 334 samples of size fractionated eukaryotic plankton community with a suite of associated metadata (Database W1). Note that if most samples represented the piconano- (0.8-5 µm, 73 samples), nano- (5-20 µm, 74 samples), micro- (20-180 µm, 70 samples), and meso- (180-2000 µm, 76 samples) planktonic size fractions, some represented different organismal size-fractions: 0.2-3 µm (1 sample), 0.8-20 µm (6 samples), 0.8 µm - infinity (33 samples), and 3-20 µm (1 sample). The table contains the following fields: a unique sample sequence identifier; the sampling station identifier; the Tara Oceans sample identifier (TARA_xxxxxxxxxx); an INDSC accession number allowing to retrieve raw sequence data for the major nucleotide databases (short read archives at EBI, NCBI or DDBJ); the depth of sampling (Subsurface - SUR or Deep Chlorophyll Maximum - DCM); the targeted size range; the sequences template (either DNA or WGA/DNA if DNA extracted from the filters was Whole Genome Amplified); the latitude of the sampling event (decimal degrees); the longitude of the sampling event (decimal degrees); the time and date of the sampling event; the device used to collect the sample; the logsheet event corresponding to the sampling event ; the volume of water sampled (liters). Then follows information on the cleaning bioinformatics pipeline shown on Figure W2 of the supplementary litterature publication: the number of merged pairs present in the raw sequence file; the number of those sequences matching both primers; the number of sequences after quality-check filtering; the number of sequences after chimera removal; and finally the number of sequences after selecting only barcodes present in at least three copies in total and in at least two samples. Finally, are given for each sequence sample: the number of distinct sequences (metabarcodes); the number of OTUs; the average number of barcode per OTU; the Shannon diversity index based on barcodes for each sample (URL of W4 dataset in PANGAEA); and the Shannon diversity index based on each OTU (URL of W5 dataset in PANGAEA).

Analysis of the reproductive system of female vampire squid

Analysis of the reproductive system of female vampire squid to determine reproductive strategy and fecundity of vampire squid, accessioned in the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History and collected in 60, 70s from off southern California.

Appendix A. Gene identity within the cultivated species, and between the cultivated species and different wild species in tomato

High salinity is a severe constraint on tomato growth and productivity in many regions and situations. To obtain an ideal gene donor for improving the salt tolerance of tomato cultivars, the potential of tolerance response to salinity were evaluated for 14 tomato accessions including wild and cultivated species. By investigation of seed germination and seedling survival, a common cultivar, Solanum lycopersicum 'moneymaker', is evidenced significantly salt-tolerant among them and correspondingly, a wild accession, Solanum cheesmanniae 'LA0317', is most vulnerable to salinity. The performance of Moneymaker and LA0317 upon salinity was then compared in detail for their growth inhibition and some physiological changes. Complete dominance of Moneymaker and its high gene identity in tomato species lead us to use it in microarray experiment and apply it as gene donor for salt tolerance. The results indicated some mechanism differences between Moneymaker and LA0317 in salt response, proposed the potentially high salt tolerance of cultivated tomato and implied that Moneymaker is a valuable gene donor in this field, potentially minimizing the growth inhibition and yield reduction in transgenic plants.

Table 2: Bacterial diversity in Ny-Ålesund, Spitzbergen

We describe the antibiotic resistance profiling of bacterial isolates collected from Ny-Alesund, Arctic, as part of the Indian Arctic Summer Expedition 2009. It was interesting to note that the bacterial isolates collected from the Arctic showed multidrug resistance. 32% of the isolates were found to be multi- drug resistant with several combinations of antibiotics. The 16S rRNA sequencing results shows a diverse group of bacteria belonging to Phyla Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria and Bacteriodetes and their relatedness was studied by phylogenetic analysis. While analysing the plasmid profiling, the most resistant two strains of Pseudomonas migulae showed multiple plasmids of varying sizes ~5.2-5.3 kb and ~9.5 kb. The extent and frequency of multidrug resistance in the polar bacteria deserves close monitoring and efforts to understand the various molecular mechanisms of drug resistance and control the spread of antibiotic resistance in polar environment is called for.