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Agarose-Based Model Ecosystem for Cultivating Methanotrophs in a Methane-Oxygen Counter Gradient
Published on: September 6, 2024
Insights into the obligate methanotroph Methylococcus capsulatus
Donovan P Kelly1, Christopher Anthony, J Colin Murrell
1Department of Biological Sciences, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK CV4 7AL. D.P.Kelly@warwick.ac.uk
Abstract:
Completion of the genome sequence of Methylococcus capsulatus Bath is an important event in molecular microbiology, and an achievement for which the authors deserve congratulation. M. capsulatus, along with other methanotrophs, has been the subject of intense biochemical and molecular study because of its role in the global carbon cycle: the conversion of biogenic methane to carbon dioxide. The methane monooxygenase enzymes that are central to this process also have high biotechnological potential. Analysis of the genome sequence will potentially accelerate elucidation of the regulation of methane-dependent metabolism in obligate methanotrophs, and help explain the cause of obligate methanotrophy, the phenomenon making most methanotrophs unable to grow on any substrates other than methane and a very small number of other one-carbon compounds.
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