The Ni cycle in the Southern Ocean: insights from Ni concentrations, isotopes and metagenomics

Lemaitre, Nolwenn; Faure, Emile; Zamora, Ricardo; Archer, Corey; Sieber, Matthias; Ellwood, Michael; Hassler, Christel; Lin, Yajuan; Cassar, Nicolas; Maignien, Lois; Vance, Derek

doi:10.5194/bg-23-5571-2026

Articles | Volume 23, issue 15

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-23-5571-2026

© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-23-5571-2026

© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 23, issue 15

Research article

|

12 Aug 2026

Research article |

| 12 Aug 2026

The Ni cycle in the Southern Ocean: insights from Ni concentrations, isotopes and metagenomics

Nolwenn Lemaitre, Emile Faure, Ricardo Zamora, Corey Archer, Matthias Sieber, Michael Ellwood, Christel Hassler, Yajuan Lin, Nicolas Cassar, Lois Maignien, and Derek Vance

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-23-5571-2026-supplement

Data sets

Metagenomic assemblies Jolann Pommellec et al. https://doi.org/10.12770/9c786963-e6a5-4a1c-95f8-1c6ab8a52d2b

Southern Ocean Reference Gene Catalogs Emile Faure et al. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.14181291

Genomic data specific to nickel-related genes Emile Faure and Nolwenn Lemaitre https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.29127848

The GEOTRACES Intermediate Data Product 2025 (IDP2025) GEOTRACES Intermediate Data Product Group https://doi.org/10.5285/42c92148-8d03-8be6-e063-7086abc09f0c

Model code and software

EmileFaure/Nickel_Omics Emile Faure https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21646714

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Short summary

Nickel (Ni) is a micronutrient used by microorganisms in key metabolic processes. In the Southern Ocean, we observe heavy Ni isotope compositions in surface waters from lower latitudes and near the Mertz Glacier. Combined with metagenomics, we show that isotope variation may be due preferential uptake of Ni by microorganisms using Ni-SOD and Urease enzymes. This demonstrates how marine microbiology can influence the chemistry of the ocean.