|
Blastopirellula marina
Blastopirellula marina, a member of the phylum Planctomycetota, is a halotolerant bacterium inhabiting aquatic environments.[1] B. marina was determined to be a new species by utilizing 16s rRNA sequence analysis.[1] MorphologyThis peptidoglycan-less bacterium reproduces via budding, which forms at the proximal cell pole.[1] The internal membrane is compartmentalized into three parts: central pirellulosome, riboplasm, and paryphoplasm.[1] The cells are pear-shaped and are either single or multiple form a flower pattern. The mature cells are inactive.[1] Dr. Schlesner observed that the "colonies are greyish to brownish white."[1] MetabolismBlastopirellula marina influences carbon cycling in the environment.[2] Dr. Schlesner discovered that "it's strictly aerobic and glucose is not metabolized anaerobically either by fermentation or with nitrogen as the electron acceptor."[1] Carbon sources can be fructose, glycerol, glutamic acid, pyruvate glucuronic acid, lyxose, and chondroitin sulfate.[1][3] It produces H2S from thiosulfate but does not produce acetoin or indole.[1] It’s catalase and cytochrome oxidase positive with no urease activity but has lipase activity.[1] DistributionBlastopirellula marina was first isolated from brackish water of the Baltic Sea by Dr. Schlesner.[4] It resides in eutrophic, salty, aquatic environments. MediaBlastopirellula narina grows on M-14 medium at 30° celsius.[2] It requires NaCl for growth and is unable to grow on freshwater medium.[5][4] B. marina can tolerate high salinity, ranging from 0.4%-6.0%.[6][3] It’s also able to grow without the assistance of vitamins in the media.[1] EcologyIt is a BSL-1 thus it’s not known to cause disease in healthy adults or threaten the surrounding environment.[6] It’s "resistant to ampicillin, penicillin, cephalothin, streptomycin, and cycloserine, but not tetracycline."[1] GenomeSix strains have been sequenced: DSM 3645, HEX-2 MGV, NAP PRIS-MGV, Nap-Phe MGV, Hex-1 MGV and HEX PRIS-MGV.[5] Through analysis of these sequenced strains, "the median length is 7.3879 Mb, median protein count is 5890 and the median GC% is 57."[6] It contains genes for lactic acid fermentation but that function has not been discovered yet.[3] References
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
