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Applied and Environmental Microbiology, December 2008, p. 7265-7271, Vol. 74, No. 23
0099-2240/08/$08.00+0 doi:10.1128/AEM.00540-08
Copyright © 2008, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

University of Colorado—Boulder, Department of Geological Sciences, UCB 399, Boulder, Colorado 80309,1 University of Colorado—Boulder, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Campus Box 334, Boulder, Colorado 803092
Received 5 March 2008/ Accepted 30 September 2008
Several Bacillus and Paenibacillus species were isolated from Fe and Mn oxide minerals precipitating at a deep subsurface oxic-anoxic interface at Henderson Molybdenum Mine, Empire, CO. The isolates were investigated for their Mn(II)-oxidizing potential and interrogated for possession of the mnxG gene, a gene that codes for a putative Mn(II)-oxidizing enzyme in Bacillus species. Seven of eight Bacillus species were capable of Mn(II) oxidation; however, the mnxG gene was detected in only one isolate. Using sequences of known Bacillus species both with and without amplifiable mnxG genes and Henderson Mine isolates, the 16S rRNA and mnxG gene phylogenies were compared to determine if 16S rRNA sequences could be used to predict the presence or absence of an amplifiable mnxG gene within the genomes of the isolates. We discovered a strong correspondence between 16S rRNA sequence similarity and the presence/absence of an amplifiable mnxG gene in the isolates. The data revealed a complex phylogenetic distribution of the mnxG gene in which vertical inheritance and gene loss influence the distribution of the gene among the Bacillus species included in this study. Comparisons of 16S rRNA and functional gene phylogenies can be used as a tool to aid in unraveling the history and dispersal of the mnxG gene within the Bacillus clade.
Published ahead of print on 10 October 2008.
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