Thermotoga lettingae can salvage cobinamide to synthesize vitamin B12

We recently reported that the Thermotogales acquired the ability to synthesize vitamin B12 by acquisition of genes from two distantly related lineages, Archaea and Firmicutes (K. S. Swithers et al., Genome Biol. Evol. 4:730-739, 2012). Ancestral state reconstruction suggested that the cobinamide salvage gene cluster was present in the Thermotogales' most recent common ancestor. We also predicted that Thermotoga lettingae could not synthesize B12 de novo but could use the cobinamide salvage pathway to synthesize B12. In this study, these hypotheses were tested, and we found that Tt. lettingae did not synthesize B12 de novo but salvaged cobinamide. The growth rate of Tt. lettingae increased with the addition of B12 or cobinamide to its medium. It synthesized B12 when the medium was supplemented with cobinamide, and no B12 was detected in cells grown on cobinamide-deficient medium. Upstream of the cobinamide salvage genes is a putative B12 riboswitch. In other organisms, B12 riboswitches allow for higher transcriptional activity in the absence of B12. When Tt. lettingae was grown with no B12, the salvage genes were upregulated compared to cells grown with B12 or cobinamide. Another gene cluster with a putative B12 riboswitch upstream is the btuFCD ABC transporter, and it showed a transcription pattern similar to that of the cobinamide salvage genes. The BtuF proteins from species that can and cannot salvage cobinamides were shown in vitro to bind both B12 and cobinamide. These results suggest that Thermotogales species can use the BtuFCD transporter to import both B12 and cobinamide, even if they cannot salvage cobinamide.