Figure 1.

Photographs of the sampling site and cyanobacteria-dominated microbial mat. (a) The dark blue-green microbial mats developed at the “Stream Site” of Nakabusa Hot Springs, Japan [19]. (b) The microbial mat core samples collected at each time point were 8 mm in diameter and approx. 15 mm thick. The upper 3 mm of the core samples was used in this study.