Community Composition and Functional Characterization of Microorganisms in Surface Sediment of the New Britain Trench

The deep-sea harbors abundant prokaryotic biomass is a major site of organic carbon remineralization and long-term carbon burial in the ocean. Deep-sea trenches are the deepest part of the ocean, and their special geological and morphological features promoting the accumulation of organic matter and active organic carbon turnover. Despite the expanding reports about the organic matter inputs, limited information is known regarding microbial processes in deep-sea trenches. In this study, we investigated the species composition and metabolic potential in surface sediment of the New Britain Trench (NBT), using a metagenomic approach. The predominant microbial taxa in NBT sediment include Proteobacteria, Acidobacteria, Planctomycetes, Actinobacteria and Chloroflexota. The microbial communities showed highly diverse metabolic potentials. Particularly, genes encoding enzymes for degradation of aromatic compounds, as well as those encoding haloalkane dehalogenase and haloacetate dehalogenase were annotated in the NBT surface sediment, which indicate the potential of microorganisms to degrade different types of refractory organic matter. The functional genes encoding enzymes for dissimilatory nitrate reduction, denitrification, and nitrification were also represented in the NBT metagenome. Overall, the microbial communities show high diversity of heterotrophic lineages and metabolic features, supporting their potential contributions in organic carbon metabolism. Meanwhile, Nitrosopumilus, a dominant genus in the surface sediment of the NBT, is a typical ammonia-oxidizing archaea (AOA), with autotrophic CO₂ fixation pathways including the 3-hydroxypropionate/4-hydroxybutylate (3HP/4HB) cycle, the reductive TCA (rTCA) cycle. The results demonstrate that autotrophic metabolic processes also play an important role in the surface sediment, by providing newly synthesized organic matter.