Project description:Cyanobacteria are phototrophic prokaryotes that can convert inorganic carbon as CO2 into organic carbon compounds at the expense of light energy. In addition, they need only a few inorganic nutrients and can be cultivated in high densities using non-arable land and seawater. This features qualified cyanobacteria as attractive organisms for the production of third generation biofuels as part of the development of future CO2-neutral energy production. Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803 represents one of the most widely used cyanobacterial model strains. On the basis of its available genome sequence and genetic tools, many strains of Synechocystis have been generated that produce different biotechnological products. Efficient isoprene production is an attractive goal, since this compound represents not only an energy-rich biofuel but is also used as chemical feedstock. Here, we report on our attempts to generate isoprene-producing strains of Synechocystis. The cDNA of a codon-optimized plant isoprene synthase (IspS) was cloned under the control of different Synechocystis promoters, which ensure strong constitutive or light-regulated ispS expression. The expression of the ispS gene was quantified by qPCR, whereas the amount of isoprene was quantified using GC-MS. Incubation of our strains at different salt conditions had marked impact on the isoprene production rates. Under low salt conditions, a good correlation was found between ispS expression and isoprene production rate. However, the cultivation of isoprene production strains under salt-supplemented conditions decreased isoprene production despite the fact that ispS expression was salt-stimulated. The characterization of the metabolome of isoprene producing strains indicated that isoprene production might be limited by insufficient precursor levels. Our isoprene production rates under low salt conditions were 2 - 6.5times higher compared to the previous report of Lindberg et al. (2010). These results can be used to guide future attempts establishing the isoprene production with cyanobacterial host systems.
Project description:Salt marshes provide many key ecosystem services that have tremendous ecological and economic value. One critical service is the removal of fixed nitrogen from coastal waters, which limits the negative effects of eutrophication resulting from increased nutrient supply. Nutrient enrichment of salt marsh sediments results in higher rates of nitrogen cycling and, commonly, a concurrent increase in the flux of nitrous oxide, an important greenhouse gas. Little is known, however, regarding controls on the microbial communities that contribute to nitrous oxide fluxes in marsh sediments. To address this disconnect, we generated microbial community profiles as well as directly assayed nitrogen cycling genes that encode the enzymes responsible for overall nitrous oxide flux from salt marsh sediments. We hypothesized that communities of microbes responsible for nitrogen transformations will be structured by nitrogen availability. Taxa that respond positively to high nitrogen inputs may be responsible for the elevated rates of nitrogen cycling processes measured in fertilized sediments. Our data show that, with the exception of ammonia-oxidizing archaea, the community composition of organisms responsible for production and consumption of nitrous oxide was altered under nutrient enrichment. These results suggest that elevated rates of nitrous oxide production and consumption are the result of changes in community structure, not simply changes in microbial activity.
Project description:Functional redundancy in bacterial communities is expected to allow microbial assemblages to survive perturbation by allowing continuity in function despite compositional changes in communities. Recent evidence suggests, however, that microbial communities change both composition and function as a result of disturbance. We present evidence for a third response: resistance. We examined microbial community response to perturbation caused by nutrient enrichment in salt marsh sediments using deep pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA and functional gene microarrays targeting the nirS gene. Composition of the microbial community, as demonstrated by both genes, was unaffected by significant variations in external nutrient supply, despite demonstrable and diverse nutrient–induced changes in many aspects of marsh ecology. The lack of response to external forcing demonstrates a remarkable uncoupling between microbial composition and ecosystem-level biogeochemical processes and suggests that sediment microbial communities are able to resist some forms of perturbation. nirS gene diversity from two salt marsh experiments, GSM (4 treatments, 8 samples, duplicate arrays, four replicate blocks per array, 8 arrays per slide) and PIE (2 treatments, 16 samples, duplicate arrays four replicate blocks per array, 8 arrays per slide)
Project description:Vibrio natriegens is a rapidly growing salt marsh bacterium that is being developed as a synthetic biology chassis. We characterized its physiological response to different salinities and temperatures in order to optimize culturing conditions and understand its adaptations to a salt marsh environment. Using metabolomics, transcriptomics, and proteomics we determined what pathways respond to these environmental parameters. We found that organic osmolyte synthesis and membrane transporters were most responsive to changes in salinity. The primary osmolytes were glutamate, glutamine, and ectoine, responding to salinity across temperature treatments. However, when media was supplemented with choline, glycine betaine seemed to mostly replace ectoine. These results provide a baseline dataset of metabolic activity under a variety of conditions that will inform decisions made about culturing and genome engineering for future applications.
Project description:Functional redundancy in bacterial communities is expected to allow microbial assemblages to survive perturbation by allowing continuity in function despite compositional changes in communities. Recent evidence suggests, however, that microbial communities change both composition and function as a result of disturbance. We present evidence for a third response: resistance. We examined microbial community response to perturbation caused by nutrient enrichment in salt marsh sediments using deep pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA and functional gene microarrays targeting the nirS gene. Composition of the microbial community, as demonstrated by both genes, was unaffected by significant variations in external nutrient supply, despite demonstrable and diverse nutrient–induced changes in many aspects of marsh ecology. The lack of response to external forcing demonstrates a remarkable uncoupling between microbial composition and ecosystem-level biogeochemical processes and suggests that sediment microbial communities are able to resist some forms of perturbation.
Project description:Cyanobacteria are valuable organisms for studying the physiology of photosynthesis and carbon fixation as well as metabolic engineering for the production of fuels and chemicals. This work describes a novel counter selection method for the cyanobacterium Synechococcus sp. PCC 7002 based on organic acid toxicity. The organic acids acrylate, 3-hydroxypropionate, and propionate were shown to be inhibitory towards PCC 7002 and other cyanobacteria at low concentrations. Inhibition was overcome by a loss of function mutation in the gene acsA. Loss of AcsA function was used as a basis for an acrylate counter selection method. DNA fragments of interest were inserted into the acsA locus and strains harboring the insertion were isolated on selective medium containing acrylate. This methodology was also used to introduce DNA fragments into a pseudogene, glpK. Application of this method will allow for more advanced genetics and engineering studies in PCC 7002 including the construction of markerless gene deletions and insertions. The acrylate counter-selection could be applied to other cyanobacterial species where AcsA activity confers acrylate sensitivity (e.g. Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803). Cultures were grown in medium modified with 5mM acrylic acid at pH 8 and compared to cultures grown in unmodified medium. Samples were processed in duplicate.
Project description:Time series metasecretomes (weeks 1, 3, 5 and ten) of lignocellulose responsive microbiomes enriching on Spartina anglica biomass for 16 weeks in a natural UK salt marsh (Welwick, Humber estuary).