BACKGROUND INFORMATION Marine nematodes belonging to the Stilbonematidae (Desmodoridae) family are described as living in obligatory association with sulfur-oxidizing chemoautotrophic ectosymbionts. The symbiotic bacteria carrying out this chemosynthesis should contain elemental sulfur in periplasmic granules as sulfur granules of chemoautotrophic endosymbionts described in various marine inver...

Sulfur-oxidizing epsilonproteobacteria are common in a variety of sulfidogenic environments. These autotrophic and mixotrophic sulfur-oxidizing bacteria are believed to contribute substantially to the oxidative portion of the global sulfur cycle. In order to better understand the ecology and roles of sulfur-oxidizing epsilonproteobacteria, in particular those of the widespread genus Sulfurimona...

As the most ancient metazoan, sponges have established close relationships with particular microbial symbionts. However, the characteristics and physiology of thioautotrophic symbionts in deep-sea sponges are largely unknown. Using a tailored "differential coverage binning" method on 22-Gb metagenomic sequences, we recovered the nearly complete genome of a sulfur-oxidizing bacterium (SOB) that ...

Acidithiobacillus caldus is a moderately thermophilic, acidophilic bacterium that has been reported to be the dominant sulfur oxidizer in stirred-tank processes used to treat gold-bearing arsenopyrite ores. It is also widely distributed in heap reactors used for the extraction of metals from ores. Not only are these bacteria commercially important, they have an interesting physiology, the study...

Growth of five strains of sulfur-oxidizing bacteria Acidithiobacillus thiooxidans, including strain NB1-3, was inhibited completely by 50 microM of sodium tungstate (Na(2)WO(4)). When the cells of NB1-3 were incubated in 0.1 M beta-alanine-SO(4)(2-) buffer (pH 3.0) with 100 microM Na(2)WO(4) for 1 h, the amount of tungsten bound to the cells was 33 microg/mg protein. Approximately 10 times more...

An anaerobic, mesophilic, syntrophic fatty-acid-oxidizing bacterium, designated strain OL-4(T), was isolated as a co-culture with Methanobacterium formicicum DSM 1535(NT) from an anaerobic expanded granular sludge bed reactor used to treat an oleate-based effluent. Strain OL-4(T) degraded oleate, a mono-unsaturated fatty acid, and straight-chain fatty acids C(4 : 0)-C(18 : 0) in syntrophic asso...

Transient-state experiments with the obligately autotrophic Thiobacillus sp. strain W5 revealed that sulfide oxidation proceeds in two physiological phases, (i) the sulfate-producing phase and (ii) the sulfur- and sulfate-producing phase, after which sulfide toxicity occurs. Specific sulfur-producing characteristics were independent of the growth rate. Sulfur formation was shown to occur when t...

Two strains of obligate chemolithoautotrophic sulfur-oxidizing bacteria were isolated from soda-lake sediments by enrichment culture with thiocyanate and nitrate at pH 9.9. The isolates were capable of growth with thiocyanate or thiosulfate as electron donor, either aerobically or anaerobically, and with nitrate or nitrite as electron acceptor. Cyanate was identified as an intermediate of thioc...

An anaerobic enrichment medium (pH 10) with thiosulfate as electron donor and nitrate as electron acceptor was inoculated with sediment from soda lake Fazda (Wadi Natrun, Egypt); a novel strain, ALEN 1(T), was isolated from the subsequent enrichment culture. Cells of strain ALEN 1(T) had a spiral morphology (0.3-0.45 x 1-4 microm), were motile and had a single polar flagellum. Sphaeroplasts wer...