TABLE 5.

Normalized counts of genes of the EggNOG database of soils with the three different Hg contamination levels (n = 3).

Functional categories	Low Hg	Moderate Hg	High Hg	P +
I) Information storage and processing:
RNA processing and modification (A)	2,960	3,070	3,037	0.77
Chromatin structure and dynamics (B)	1,821	1,969	1,839	0.62
Translation, ribosomal structure and b. (J)	1,508,524	1,560,644	1,639,956	0.028
Transcription (K)	1,206,550	1,213,370	1,259,839	0.23
Replication, combination and repair (L)	1,677,359	1,752,886	1,752,902	0.10
II) Cellular processes and signaling:
Cell cycle control, cell division, chrom. (D)	191,131	199,463	207,096	0.042
Cell wall/membrane/envelope biogen. (M)	1,115,342	1,172,191	1,161,652	< 0.001
Cell motility (N)	83,656	89,462	94,148	0.30
Posttranslational modification, prot. (O)	792,763	816,456	826,600	0.045
Signal transduction mechanisms (T)	752,226	763,031	765,452	0.40
Intracellular trafficking, secretion, and v. (U)	347,385	359,107	381,949	0.007
Defense mechanisms (V)	396,746	382,594	387,756	0.77
Extracellular structures (W)	822	673	720	0.40
Nuclear structure (Y)	13	21	21	0.80
Cytoskeleton (Z)	3,171	3,220	3,303	0.86
III) Metabolism:
Energy production and conversion (C)	1,652,084	1,760,398	1,779,031	0.09
Amino acid transport and metabolism (E)	1,228,039	1,269,264	1,280,520	0.17
Nucleotide transport and metabolism (F)	514,332	532,611	549,313	0.06
Carbohydrate transport and metabolism (G)	911,058	957,628	973,565	0.08
Coenzyme transport and metabolism (H)	656,485	689,321	686,603	0.019
Lipid transport and metabolism (I)	421,199	442,271	431,250	0.040
Inorganic ion transport and metabolism (P)	1,210,716	1,269,580	1,340,935	0.028
Secondary metabolites biosynthesis, tr. (Q)	192,976	197,890	196,003	0.61
IV) Poorly characterized:
Function unknown (S)	6,505,870	6,634,080	6,617,739	0.024

⁺Effect of Hg contamination assessed by analysis of variance (ANOVA); significant values (P < 0.05) are in bold.