Probing novel syntrophic microbial interactions
Abstract
This project aims to dissect the interactions between microbes in a synthetic syntrophic system aiming to understand bow syntrophic systems exchange metabolites, electrons, and possibly larger cellular components like proteins and nucleic acids. Syntrophy refers to the co-existence or at least two microbes whereby one feeds off the products of the other. The proposed synthetic syntrophy is made up of an acetogen and at least one other organism that can be engineered to produce desirable metabolites. Acetogens are anaerobic organisms that fix enormous quantities of CO2 in the geobiosphere using the celebrated Wood-Ljungdahl pathway. There has been increasing interest in acetogens for both fundamental reasons and to achieve sustainable solutions to manufacturing and disposal of waste materials resulting from human activity. A key difficulty with acetogens is that, in monoculture, they grow slowly on gaseous substrates, to low cell densities, and produce only 2-C molecules in larger quantities. Acetogenic mixotrophy, whereby the acetogen is fed both a sugar and a gas mixture to be utilized simultaneously, has been proposed to overcome some of these limitations. To broaden the impact of mixotrophy, synthetic anaerobic syntrophy is proposed in this project. Our preliminary data demonstrated profound and unexpected outcomes from this syntrophic system, thus leading to several fundamental hypotheses. Methods will be developed to enable dissection of the syntrophic interactions and their metabolic outcomes at the cellular level. These include optical microscopy, standard and specialized transmission electron microscopy, fluorescence microscopy and assays to detect transfer of plasmid DNA. Understanding the behavior of novel and unpredictable syntrophic systems, including the direct exchange of metabolites, electrons and macromolecules, is of importance in many biological systems and their applications Syntrophies are encountered in many complex biological systems, and their dissection will advance many aspects of biological sciences and of complex natural and synthetic systems. Syntrophic systems are relevant to the study of various natural and synthetic microbiomes and their applications, such as in human health, in environmental systems and in biotechnological applications. For example, our findings can be used as a basis for engineering robust syntrophic systems to enable to use of waste materials (municipal, agricultural industrial) after gasification together with biomass-derived carbohydrates, accompanied by CO2 filtration to produce chemicals and fuel molecules and power the development of a sustainable economy.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- May 07, 2018
- Source ID
- W911NF1710343
Entities
People
- Eleftherios T Papoutsakis
Organizations
- Army Contracting Command
- United States Army
- University of Delaware