Dynamics in bacterial surface properties of a natural bacterial community in the coastal North Sea during a spring phytoplankton bloom

The hydrophilic and hydrophobic properties of single cells of natural bacterioplankton communities were determined using a recently developed staining method combined with confocal laser scanning microscopy and advanced image analysis. On an average, about 50% of the bacterial cell area was covered by hydrophobic and only 16% by hydrophilic properties, while about 72% was covered by the genome. However, the size of these properties was independent of the bacterial cell size. Bacterial hydrophobicity was positively correlated with ambient NH4+ concentrations and negatively correlated with overall bacterial abundance. The expression of hydrophilicity was more dynamic. Over the spring phytoplankton bloom, the bacterioplankton ratio_phil/phob repeatedly reached highest values shortly before peaks in bacterioplankton abundance were observed, indicating a direct and fast response of bacterial surface properties, especially hydrophilicity, to changing environmental conditions. Compared to bacterial strains, recently studied with the same method, cells of marine bacterioplankton communities are much smaller and less frequently covered by hydrophobic or hydrophilic properties. While the percentage area covered by the genome is essentially the same, the percentage area covered by hydrophobic or hydrophilic properties is much smaller.