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A stable genetic polymorphism underpinning microbial syntrophy
Syntrophies are metabolic cooperations, whereby two organisms co-metabolize a substrate in an interdependent manner. Many of the observed natural syntrophic interactions are mandatory in the absence of strong electron acceptors, such that one species in the syntrophy has to assume the role of electr...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Nature Publishing Group
2016
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5042321/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27258948 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/ismej.2016.80 |
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author | Großkopf, Tobias Zenobi, Simone Alston, Mark Folkes, Leighton Swarbreck, David Soyer, Orkun S |
author_facet | Großkopf, Tobias Zenobi, Simone Alston, Mark Folkes, Leighton Swarbreck, David Soyer, Orkun S |
author_sort | Großkopf, Tobias |
collection | PubMed |
description | Syntrophies are metabolic cooperations, whereby two organisms co-metabolize a substrate in an interdependent manner. Many of the observed natural syntrophic interactions are mandatory in the absence of strong electron acceptors, such that one species in the syntrophy has to assume the role of electron sink for the other. While this presents an ecological setting for syntrophy to be beneficial, the potential genetic drivers of syntrophy remain unknown to date. Here, we show that the syntrophic sulfate-reducing species Desulfovibrio vulgaris displays a stable genetic polymorphism, where only a specific genotype is able to engage in syntrophy with the hydrogenotrophic methanogen Methanococcus maripaludis. This 'syntrophic' genotype is characterized by two genetic alterations, one of which is an in-frame deletion in the gene encoding for the ion-translocating subunit cooK of the membrane-bound COO hydrogenase. We show that this genotype presents a specific physiology, in which reshaping of energy conservation in the lactate oxidation pathway enables it to produce sufficient intermediate hydrogen for sustained M. maripaludis growth and thus, syntrophy. To our knowledge, these findings provide for the first time a genetic basis for syntrophy in nature and bring us closer to the rational engineering of syntrophy in synthetic microbial communities. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-5042321 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2016 |
publisher | Nature Publishing Group |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-50423212016-12-06 A stable genetic polymorphism underpinning microbial syntrophy Großkopf, Tobias Zenobi, Simone Alston, Mark Folkes, Leighton Swarbreck, David Soyer, Orkun S ISME J Original Article Syntrophies are metabolic cooperations, whereby two organisms co-metabolize a substrate in an interdependent manner. Many of the observed natural syntrophic interactions are mandatory in the absence of strong electron acceptors, such that one species in the syntrophy has to assume the role of electron sink for the other. While this presents an ecological setting for syntrophy to be beneficial, the potential genetic drivers of syntrophy remain unknown to date. Here, we show that the syntrophic sulfate-reducing species Desulfovibrio vulgaris displays a stable genetic polymorphism, where only a specific genotype is able to engage in syntrophy with the hydrogenotrophic methanogen Methanococcus maripaludis. This 'syntrophic' genotype is characterized by two genetic alterations, one of which is an in-frame deletion in the gene encoding for the ion-translocating subunit cooK of the membrane-bound COO hydrogenase. We show that this genotype presents a specific physiology, in which reshaping of energy conservation in the lactate oxidation pathway enables it to produce sufficient intermediate hydrogen for sustained M. maripaludis growth and thus, syntrophy. To our knowledge, these findings provide for the first time a genetic basis for syntrophy in nature and bring us closer to the rational engineering of syntrophy in synthetic microbial communities. Nature Publishing Group 2016-12 2016-06-03 /pmc/articles/PMC5042321/ /pubmed/27258948 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/ismej.2016.80 Text en Copyright © 2016 International Society for Microbial Ecology http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |
spellingShingle | Original Article Großkopf, Tobias Zenobi, Simone Alston, Mark Folkes, Leighton Swarbreck, David Soyer, Orkun S A stable genetic polymorphism underpinning microbial syntrophy |
title | A stable genetic polymorphism underpinning microbial syntrophy |
title_full | A stable genetic polymorphism underpinning microbial syntrophy |
title_fullStr | A stable genetic polymorphism underpinning microbial syntrophy |
title_full_unstemmed | A stable genetic polymorphism underpinning microbial syntrophy |
title_short | A stable genetic polymorphism underpinning microbial syntrophy |
title_sort | stable genetic polymorphism underpinning microbial syntrophy |
topic | Original Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5042321/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27258948 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/ismej.2016.80 |
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