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Bacterial Group II Introns in a Deep-Sea Hydrothermal Vent Environment

Biology Department, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution,¹ Marine Biological Laboratories, Woods Hole, Massachusetts 02543,² Department of Molecular Biology, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, Dallas, Texas 75390-9148³

Received 22 July 2002/ Accepted 25 September 2002

Group II introns are catalytic RNAs and mobile retrotransposable elements known to be present in the genomes of some nonmarine bacteria and eukaryotic organelles. Here we report the discovery of group II introns in a bacterial mat sample collected from a deep-sea hydrothermal vent near 9°N on the East Pacific Rise. One of the introns was shown to self-splice in vitro. This is the first example of marine bacterial introns from molecular population structure studies of microorganisms that live in the proximity of hydrothermal vents. These types of mobile genetic elements may prove useful in improving our understanding of bacterial genome evolution and may serve as valuable markers in comparative studies of bacterial communities.

Contribution 10836 from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

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