This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowReprints and Permissions
Right arrow Copyright Information
Right arrow Books from ASM Press
Right arrow MicrobeWorld
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via HighWire
Right arrow Citing Articles via Google Scholar
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Ansede, J. H.
Right arrow Articles by Yoch, D. C.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Ansede, J. H.
Right arrow Articles by Yoch, D. C.
Agricola
Right arrow Articles by Ansede, J. H.
Right arrow Articles by Yoch, D. C.

 Previous Article  |  Next Article 

Applied and Environmental Microbiology, March 2001, p. 1210-1217, Vol. 67, No. 3
0099-2240/01/$04.00+0   DOI: 10.1128/AEM.67.3.1210-1217.2001
Copyright © 2001, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.

Phylogenetic Analysis of Culturable Dimethyl Sulfide-Producing Bacteria from a Spartina-Dominated Salt Marsh and Estuarine Water

John H. Ansede, Robert Friedman, and Duane C. Yoch*

Department of Biological Sciences, University of South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina 29208

Received 29 September 2000/Accepted 4 January 2001

Dimethylsulfoniopropionate (DMSP), an abundant osmoprotectant found in marine algae and salt marsh cordgrass, can be metabolized to dimethyl sulfide (DMS) and acrylate by microbes having the enzyme DMSP lyase. A suite of DMS-producing bacteria isolated from a salt marsh and adjacent estuarine water on DMSP agar plates differed markedly from the pelagic strains currently in culture. While many of the salt marsh and estuarine isolates produced DMS and methanethiol from methionine and dimethyl sulfoxide, none appeared to be capable of producing both methanethiol and DMS from DMSP. DMSP, and its degradation products acrylate and beta -hydroxypropionate but not methyl-3-mecaptopropionate or 3-mercaptopropionate, served as a carbon source for the growth of all the alpha - and beta - but only some of the gamma -proteobacterium isolates. Phylogenetic analysis of 16S rRNA gene sequences showed that all of the isolates were in the group Proteobacteria, with most of them belonging to the alpha  and gamma  subclasses. Only one isolate was identified as a beta -proteobacterium, and it had >98% 16S rRNA sequence homology with a terrestrial species of Alcaligenes faecalis. Although bacterial population analysis based on culturability has its limitations, bacteria from the alpha  and gamma  subclasses of the Proteobacteria were the dominant DMS producers isolated from salt marsh sediments and estuaries, with the gamma  subclass representing 80% of the isolates. The alpha -proteobacterium isolates were all in the Roseobacter subgroup, while many of the gamma -proteobacteria were closely related to the pseudomonads; others were phylogenetically related to Marinomonas, Psychrobacter, or Vibrio species. These data suggest that DMSP cleavage to DMS and acrylate is a characteristic widely distributed among different phylotypes in the salt marsh-estuarine ecosystem.

* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Department of Biological Sciences, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC 29208. Phone:(803) 777-2322. Fax: (803) 777-4002. E-mail: yoch{at}biol.sc.edu.

Applied and Environmental Microbiology, March 2001, p. 1210-1217, Vol. 67, No. 3
0099-2240/01/$04.00+0   DOI: 10.1128/AEM.67.3.1210-1217.2001
Copyright © 2001, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.


This article has been cited by other articles:

  • Raina, J.-B., Tapiolas, D., Willis, B. L., Bourne, D. G. (2009). Coral-Associated Bacteria and Their Role in the Biogeochemical Cycling of Sulfur. Appl. Environ. Microbiol. 75: 3492-3501 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
  • Johnston, A. W. B., Todd, J. D., Sun, L., Nikolaidou-Katsaridou, M. N., Curson, A. R. J., Rogers, R. (2008). Molecular diversity of bacterial production of the climate-changing gas, dimethyl sulphide, a molecule that impinges on local and global symbioses. J Exp Bot 59: 1059-1067 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
  • Todd, J. D., Rogers, R., Li, Y. G., Wexler, M., Bond, P. L., Sun, L., Curson, A. R. J., Malin, G., Steinke, M., Johnston, A. W. B. (2007). Structural and Regulatory Genes Required to Make the Gas Dimethyl Sulfide in Bacteria. Science 315: 666-669 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
  • Mou, X., Moran, M. A., Stepanauskas, R., Gonzalez, J. M., Hodson, R. E. (2005). Flow-Cytometric Cell Sorting and Subsequent Molecular Analyses for Culture-Independent Identification of Bacterioplankton Involved in Dimethylsulfoniopropionate Transformations. Appl. Environ. Microbiol. 71: 1405-1416 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
  • Wagner-Dobler, I., Rheims, H., Felske, A., Pukall, R., Tindall, B. J. (2003). Jannaschia helgolandensis gen. nov., sp. nov., a novel abundant member of the marine Roseobacter clade from the North Sea. Int. J. Syst. Evol. Microbiol. 53: 731-738 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
  • Yoch, D. C. (2002). Dimethylsulfoniopropionate: Its Sources, Role in the Marine Food Web, and Biological Degradation to Dimethylsulfide. Appl. Environ. Microbiol. 68: 5804-5815 [Full Text]  
  • Ansede, J. H., Pellechia, P. J., Yoch, D. C. (2001). Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Analysis of [1-13C]Dimethylsulfoniopropionate (DMSP) and [1-13C]Acrylate Metabolism by a DMSP Lyase-Producing Marine Isolate of the {alpha}-Subclass of Proteobacteria. Appl. Environ. Microbiol. 67: 3134-3139 [Abstract] [Full Text]  


Copyright © 2009 by the American Society for Microbiology.   For an alternate route to Journals.ASM.org, visit: http://intl-journals.asm.org | More Info»