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Applied and Environmental Microbiology, November 1998, p. 4202-4209, Vol. 64, No. 11
Department of Microbiology, GBF
Received 22 December 1997/Accepted 11 August 1998
The occurrence and abundance of microbial fatty acids have been
used for the identification of microorganisms in microbial communities.
However, these fatty acids can also be used as indicators of substrate
usage. For this, a systematic investigation of the discrimination of
the stable carbon isotopes by different microorganisms is necessary. We
grew 11 strains representing major bacterial and fungal species with
four different isotopically defined carbon sources and
determined the isotope ratios of fatty acids of different lipid
fractions. A comparison of the differences of
0099-2240/98/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1998, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
Ratios of Carbon Isotopes in Microbial Lipids
as an Indicator of Substrate Usage
Gesellschaft
für Biotechnologische Forschung mbH, D-38124 Braunschweig,
Germany
13C values
of palmitic acid (C16:0) with the 13C values
of the substrates revealed that the isotope ratio is independent of the
growth stage and that most microorganisms showed enrichment of
C16:0 with 13C when growing on glycerol. With
the exception of Burkholderia gladioli, all
microorganism showed depletion of 13C in C16:0
while incorporating the carbons of glucose, and most of them were
enriched with 13C from mannose, with the exception of
Pseudomonas fluorescens and the Zygomycotina. Usually, the
glycolipid fractions are depleted in 13C compared to the
phospholipid fractions. The 13C pattern was not uniform
within the different fatty acids of a given microbial species.
Generally, tetradecanoic acid (C14:0) was depleted of
13C compared to palmitic acid (C16:0) while
octadecanoic acid (C18:0) was enriched. These results are
important for the calibration of a new method in which
13C values of fatty acids from the environment delineate
the use of bacterial substrates in an ecosystem.
*
Corresponding author. Mailing address: Department
of Microbiology, GBFGesellschaft für Biotechnologische
Forschung mbH, Mascheroder Weg 1, D-38124 Braunschweig,
Germany. Phone: 49-531-6181-419. Fax: 49-531-6181-411. E-mail:
WAB{at}GBF.de.
Applied and Environmental Microbiology, November 1998, p. 4202-4209, Vol. 64, No. 11
0099-2240/98/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1998, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
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