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“Altiarchaeales”: Uncultivated Archaea from the Subsurface

Due to the limited cultivability of the vast majority of microorganisms, researchers have applied environmental genomics and other state-of-the-art technologies to gain insights into the biology of uncultivated Archaea and bacteria in their natural biotope. In this review, we summarize the scientifi...

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Autores principales: Probst, Alexander J., Moissl-Eichinger, Christine
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2015
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4500143/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25984733
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/life5021381
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author Probst, Alexander J.
Moissl-Eichinger, Christine
author_facet Probst, Alexander J.
Moissl-Eichinger, Christine
author_sort Probst, Alexander J.
collection PubMed
description Due to the limited cultivability of the vast majority of microorganisms, researchers have applied environmental genomics and other state-of-the-art technologies to gain insights into the biology of uncultivated Archaea and bacteria in their natural biotope. In this review, we summarize the scientific findings on a recently proposed order-level lineage of uncultivated Archaea called Altiarchaeales, which includes “Candidatus Altiarchaeum hamiconexum” as the most well-described representative. Ca. A. hamiconexum possesses a complex biology: thriving strictly anaerobically, this microorganism is capable of forming highly-pure biofilms, connecting the cells by extraordinary cell surface appendages (the “hami”) and has other highly unusual traits, such as a double-membrane-based cell wall. Indicated by genomic information from different biotopes, the Altiarchaeales seem to proliferate in deep, anoxic groundwater of Earth’s crust bearing a potentially very important function: carbon fixation. Although their net carbon fixation rate has not yet been determined, they appear as highly abundant organisms in their biotopes and may thus represent an important primary producer in the subsurface. In sum, the research over more than a decade on Ca. A. hamiconexum has revealed many interesting features of its lifestyle, its genomic information, metabolism and ultrastructure, making this archaeon one of the best-studied uncultivated Archaea in the literature.
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spelling pubmed-45001432015-07-13 “Altiarchaeales”: Uncultivated Archaea from the Subsurface Probst, Alexander J. Moissl-Eichinger, Christine Life (Basel) Review Due to the limited cultivability of the vast majority of microorganisms, researchers have applied environmental genomics and other state-of-the-art technologies to gain insights into the biology of uncultivated Archaea and bacteria in their natural biotope. In this review, we summarize the scientific findings on a recently proposed order-level lineage of uncultivated Archaea called Altiarchaeales, which includes “Candidatus Altiarchaeum hamiconexum” as the most well-described representative. Ca. A. hamiconexum possesses a complex biology: thriving strictly anaerobically, this microorganism is capable of forming highly-pure biofilms, connecting the cells by extraordinary cell surface appendages (the “hami”) and has other highly unusual traits, such as a double-membrane-based cell wall. Indicated by genomic information from different biotopes, the Altiarchaeales seem to proliferate in deep, anoxic groundwater of Earth’s crust bearing a potentially very important function: carbon fixation. Although their net carbon fixation rate has not yet been determined, they appear as highly abundant organisms in their biotopes and may thus represent an important primary producer in the subsurface. In sum, the research over more than a decade on Ca. A. hamiconexum has revealed many interesting features of its lifestyle, its genomic information, metabolism and ultrastructure, making this archaeon one of the best-studied uncultivated Archaea in the literature. MDPI 2015-05-12 /pmc/articles/PMC4500143/ /pubmed/25984733 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/life5021381 Text en © 2015 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Review
Probst, Alexander J.
Moissl-Eichinger, Christine
“Altiarchaeales”: Uncultivated Archaea from the Subsurface
title “Altiarchaeales”: Uncultivated Archaea from the Subsurface
title_full “Altiarchaeales”: Uncultivated Archaea from the Subsurface
title_fullStr “Altiarchaeales”: Uncultivated Archaea from the Subsurface
title_full_unstemmed “Altiarchaeales”: Uncultivated Archaea from the Subsurface
title_short “Altiarchaeales”: Uncultivated Archaea from the Subsurface
title_sort “altiarchaeales”: uncultivated archaea from the subsurface
topic Review
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4500143/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25984733
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/life5021381
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