Seasonal variations of marine protist community structure based on taxon-specific traits using the eastern English Channel as a model coastal system

Previous microscopy-based studies in the eastern English Channel have revealed it to be a productive meso-eutrophic coastal ecosystem, characterized by strong repeating patterns in microplankton succession. The present study examines the seasonal structure of the entire protistan community from March 2011 to July 2013, using tag pyrosequencing of the V2-V3 hypervariable region of the 18S rRNA gene. A total of 1242 OTUs and 28 high-level taxonomic groups, which included previously undetected taxa in the area, were identified. The detected OTUs were considered according to taxon-specific traits, which included their trophic role, abundance and specialization level. Taxa differentiation based on specialization level rather than abundance was more informative in describing community organization. While generalists were always abundant, numerous specialists that were either rare or absent in most samples, increased in abundance for short periods, appearing to be overall abundant. Statistical and network analyses showed that the protistan seasonal organization was influenced by environmental parameters. It also highlighted that in addition to grazers, fungi and parasites played potentially significant roles during phytoplankton blooms. Overall, while the protistan succession was mainly shaped by environmental variations, biotic interactions among co-occurring taxa were the main structural drivers of the temporal assemblages.