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  • Genome Watch
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Sink or swim

Nature Reviews Microbiology volume 5, pages 834–835 (2007)Cite this article

This month's Genome Watch discusses four unusual organisms that are found in sea and river habitats. The first two are epsilonproteobacteria that are associated with hydrothermal vents on the ocean floor, the third is a filamentous bacterium that is found growing in mats on the seabed and the fourth is a pathogen of salmonid fish. Comparisons of the genomes of these organisms with those of common pathogens can shed light on pathogenicity traits and define the unique features that characterize these peculiar species.

The epsilonproteobacteria group is the predominant bacterial group that is found in deep-sea hydrothermal-vent environments on the seabed. Nakagawa and colleagues1 recently sequenced the complete genomes of Nitratiruptor tergarcus and Sulfuvorum lithotrophicum , both of which were isolated from an active vent at a depth of 1,000 metres in Japanese waters. Both organisms have a single, small, circular chromosome, with the 1,877,931 base pair (bp) genome of N. tergarcus being the smallest of the non-pathogenic epsilonproteobacterial genomes to be sequenced so far and the 2,562,277 bp genome of S. lithotrophicum the largest. Considering the low G+C content of both organisms — 39.7% and 43.8%, respectively — and the remarkable environmental niche that they inhabit, it is perhaps surprising that the temperature range for growth is 10–37°C, with an optimum of 33°C for S. lithotrophicum, and 37–65°C, with an optimum of 55°C, for N. tergarcus. In keeping with their environmental niche, which can function either as a source or a sink for various metal ions, both species encode several heavy-metal detoxification systems and transporter proteins. S. lithotrophicum carries no genes for motility or chemotaxis, whereas N. tergarcus possesses a full complement of such genes, many of which are arranged as a single gene cluster. The unusual G+C content of this cluster suggests that it was acquired by horizontal gene transfer.

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References

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Lisa C. Crossman is at the Sanger Institute, Wellcome Trust Genome Campus, Hinxton, Cambridge CB10 1SA, UK. microbes@sanger.ac.uk,

    Lisa C. Crossman

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  1. Lisa C. Crossman
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DATABASES

Entrez Genome

Nitratiruptor tergarcus

Sulfuvorum lithotrophicum

Entrez Genome Project

Anabaena variabilis

Flavobacterium psychrophilum

Helicobacter pylori

Kuenenia stuttgartiensis

Porphyromonas gingivalis

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Crossman, L. Sink or swim. Nat Rev Microbiol 5, 834–835 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrmicro1777

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