African dust from the Sahara and Sahel regions of Northern Africa is blown intercontinental distances and is the highest portion of atmospheric dust generated each year. During the Northern Hemisphere summer months (boreal summer), these dust events travel into the Caribbean and southern United States. While viability assays, microscopy and bacterial amplicon analyses have shown that dust-associated microbes may be diverse, the specific microbial taxa that are transported intercontinental distances with these dust events remain poorly characterized. To provide new insights into these issues, five metagenomes of Saharan dust events occurring in the Caribbean, collected in the summer months of 2002 and 2008, were analyzed. The data revealed that similar microbial composition existed between three out of the five of the distinct dust events and that fungi were a prominent feature of the metagenomes compared to other environmental samples. These results have implications for better understanding of microbial transport through the atmosphere and may implicate that the dust-associated microbial load transiting the Atlantic with Saharan dust is similar from year to year.

中文翻译：

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加勒比地区非洲沙尘事件的宏基因组学调查。

来自北非撒哈拉和萨赫勒地区的非洲尘埃被吹到洲际距离，是每年产生的大气尘埃中最高的部分。在北半球夏季（北方夏季），这些沙尘事件传播到加勒比海和美国南部。虽然活力测定、显微镜和细菌扩增子分析表明，与尘埃相关的微生物可能是多种多样的，但随着这些尘埃事件在洲际距离上运输的特定微生物类群的特征仍然很差。为了对这些问题提供新的见解，分析了 2002 年和 2008 年夏季收集的在加勒比地区发生的五个撒哈拉沙尘事件宏基因组。数据显示，在五种不同的尘埃事件中，有三种存在相似的微生物组成，与其他环境样本相比，真菌是宏基因组的一个突出特征。这些结果有助于更好地理解微生物在大气中的运输，并可能暗示与撒哈拉尘埃一起穿越大西洋的尘埃相关微生物负荷年复一年相似。