Sulfur and iron concentrations in wood from three 17(th) century shipwrecks in the Baltic Sea, the Ghost wreck, the Crown and the Sword, were obtained by X-ray fluorescence (XRF) scanning. In near anaerobic environments symbiotic microorganisms degrade waterlogged wood, reduce sulfate and promote accumulation of low-valent sulfur compounds, as previously found for the famous wrecks of the Vasa ...

In the case of pyrite bioleaching by Leptospirillum ferrooxidans, an organism without sulfur-oxidizing capacity, besides the production of tetra- and pentathionate, a considerable accumulation of elemental sulfur occurred. A similar result was obtained for chemical oxidation assays with acidic, sterile iron(III) ion-containing solutions. In the case of Thiobacillus ferrooxidans, only slight amo...

Haloalkaliphiles are double extremophilic organisms thriving both at high salinity and alkaline pH. Although numerous haloalkaliphilic representatives have been identified among Archaea and Bacteria over the past 15 years, the adaptations underlying their prosperity at haloalkaline conditions are scarcely known. A multi-level adaptive strategy was proposed to occur in haloalkaliphilic organisms...

Stable isotopic distributions in the sulfur cycle were studied with pure and mixed cultures of the anaerobic bacteria, Chlorobium vibrioforme and Desulfovibrio vulgaris. D. vulgaris and C. vibrioforme can catalyze three reactions constituting a complete anaerobic sulfur cycle: reduction of sulfate to sulfide (D. vulgaris), oxidation of sulfide to elemental sulfur (C. vibrioforme), and oxidati...

The effects of sulfur concentration on the bioleaching of heavy metals from the sediment by indigenous sulfur-oxidizing bacteria were investigated in an air-lift reactor. Increasing the sulfur concentration from 0.5 to 5 g/l enhanced the rates of pH reduction, sulfate production and metal solubilization. A Michaelis-Menten type equation was used to explain the relationships between sulfur conce...

Capitella spp. is considered as an important ecological indicator of eutrophication due to its high densities in organic-rich, reduced, and sometimes polluted coastal ecosystems. We investigated whether such ability cope with adverse contexts might be a response the microorganisms these worms are associated with. In populations from French Atlantic coast (Roscoff, Brittany), we observed epibiot...

Here, we communicate the draft genome of "Acidibacillus ferrooxidans" Huett2, a novel strain of an acidophilic, heterotrophic, iron-oxidizing bacterium belonging to the phylum Firmicutes It was isolated from a water drainage system of a former minefield in Freiberg, Germany.

X-ray absorption near edge structure (XANES) spectroscopy at the sulfur K-edge was applied to probe the speciation of sulfur of metabolically different sulfur-accumulating bacteria in situ. Fitting the spectra using a least-square fitting routine XANES reveals at least three different forms of sulfur in bacterial sulfur globules. Cyclooctasulfur dominates in the sulfur globules of Beggiatoa alb...