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Applied and Environmental Microbiology, November 2002, p. 5554-5562, Vol. 68, No. 11
0099-2240/02/$04.00+0     DOI: 10.1128/AEM.68.11.5554-5562.2002
Copyright © 2002, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Widespread N-Acetyl-D-Glucosamine Uptake among Pelagic Marine Bacteria and Its Ecological Implications

Lasse Riemann* and Farooq Azam

Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, California 92093-0202

Received 29 April 2002/ Accepted 30 July 2002

Dissolved free and combined N-acetyl-D-glucosamine (NAG) is among the largest pools of amino sugars in the ocean. NAG is a main structural component in chitin and a substantial constituent of bacterial peptidoglycan and lipopolysaccharides. We studied the distribution and kinetics of NAG uptake by the phosphoenolpyruvate:NAG phosphotransferase systems (PTS) in marine bacterial isolates and natural bacterial assemblages in near-shore waters. Of 78 bacterial isolates examined, 60 took up 3H-NAG, while 18 showed no uptake. No systematic pattern in NAG uptake capability relative to phylogenetic affiliation was found, except that all isolates within Vibrionaceae took up NAG. Among 12 isolates, some showed large differences in the relationship between polymer hydrolysis (measured as chitobiase activity) and uptake of the NAG, the hydrolysis product. Pool turnover time and estimated maximum ambient concentration of dissolved NAG in samples off Scripps Pier (La Jolla, Calif.) were 5.9 ± 3.0 days (n = 10) and 5.2 ± 0.9 nM (n = 3), respectively. Carbohydrate competition experiments indicated that glucose, glucosamine, mannose, and fructose were taken up by the same system as NAG. Sensitivity to the antibiotic and NAG structural analog streptozotocin (STZ) was developed into a culture-independent approach, which demonstrated that approximately one-third of bacteria in natural marine assemblages that were synthesizing DNA took up NAG. Isolates possessing a NAG PTS system were found to be predominantly facultative anaerobes. These results suggest the hypothesis that a substantial fraction of bacteria in natural pelagic assemblages are facultative anaerobes. The adaptive value of fermentative metabolism in the pelagic environment is potentially significant, e.g., to bacteria colonizing microenvironments such as marine snow that may experience periodic O2-limitation.

* Corresponding author. Present address: Department of Environmental Chemistry and Microbiology, National Environmental Research Institute, 399 Frederiksborgvej, 4000 Roskilde, Denmark. Phone: 46301200. Fax: 46301216. E-mail: lriemann{at}vip.cybercity.dk.

Applied and Environmental Microbiology, November 2002, p. 5554-5562, Vol. 68, No. 11
0099-2240/02/$04.00+0     DOI: 10.1128/AEM.68.11.5554-5562.2002
Copyright © 2002, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.



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