New publication by Paredes et al. in mSystems

26.05.2021

"Anaerobic Sulfur Oxidation Underlies Adaptation of a Chemosynthetic Symbiont to Oxic-Anoxic Interfaces"

New publication by Gabriela Paredes, Tobias Viehböck, Raymond Lee, Marton Palatinszky, Michaela Mausz, Siegfried Reipert, Arno Schintlmeister, Andreas Maier, Jean-Marie Volland, Claudia Hirschfeld, Michael Wagner, David Berry, Stephanie Markert, Silvia Bulgheresi, Lena König

"Anaerobic Sulfur Oxidation Underlies Adaptation of a Chemosynthetic Symbiont to Oxic-Anoxic Interfaces"

 

This is the first study reporting on the global transcriptional response to oxygen of a thiotrophic animal ectosymbiont, "Ca. T. oneisti" which lives attached to marine nematodes inhabiting shallow-water sand. Surprisingly, S oxidation genes were upregulatedunder anoxic relative to oxic conditions. Furthermore, under anoxia, the ectosymbiont appeared to be less stressed and to proliferate more. We propose that animal-mediated access to oxygen, rather than enhancing sulfur oxidation, would facilitate the assimilation of carbon and nitrogen by the ectosymbiont.

 

Original paper:

Paredes GF, Viehboeck T, Lee R, Palatinszky M, Mausz MA, Reipert S, Schintlmeister A, Maier A, Volland J-M, Hirschfeld C, Wagner M, Berry D, Markert S, Bulgheresi S, König L. 2021. Anaerobic sulfur oxidation underlies adaptation of a chemosynthetic symbiont to oxic-anoxic interfaces. mSystems 6:e01186-20. doi.org/10.1128/mSystems.01186-20.

Schematic representation of central metabolic pathways present in the “Ca. T. oneisti” genome (Fig. 2)

Gabriela Paredes

Tobias Viehböck

Jean-Marie Volland

Silvia Bulgheresi

Lena König