The shrinkage of glaciers and the vanishing of glacier-fed streams (GFSs) are emblematic of climate change. However, forecasts of how GFS microbiome structure and function will change under projected climate change scenarios are lacking. Combining 2,333 prokaryotic metagenome-assembled genomes with climatic, glaciological, and environmental data collected by the Vanishing Glaciers project from 164 GFSs draining Earth's major mountain ranges, we here predict the future of the GFS microbiome until the end of the century under various climate change scenarios. Our model framework is rooted in a space-for-time substitution design and leverages statistical learning approaches. We predict that declining environmental selection promotes primary production in GFSs, stimulating both bacterial biomass and biodiversity. Concomitantly, predictions suggest that the phylogenetic structure of the GFS microbiome will change and entire bacterial clades are at risk. Furthermore, genomic projections reveal that microbiome functions will shift, with intensified solar energy acquisition pathways, heterotrophy and algal-bacterial interactions. Altogether, we project a 'greener' future of the world's GFSs accompanied by a loss of clades that have adapted to environmental harshness, with consequences for ecosystem functioning.

Department of Ecology Faculty of Science Charles University Prague Czechia

Department of Geosciences University of Fribourg Fribourg Switzerland

Laboratory of Hydraulics Hydrology and Glaciology ETH Zurich Zurich Switzerland

MARBEC University of Montpellier CNRS Ifremer IRD Montpellier France

River Ecosystems Laboratory Alpine and Polar Environmental Research Center Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne Lausanne Switzerland

Swiss Federal Institute for Forest Snow and Landscape Research Birmensdorf Switzerland

UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology Wallingford United Kingdom

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