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Updated: May 5, 2026

Author Spotlight: Designing Simple and Inexpensive Techniques to Grow Methane-Oxidizing Bacteria in the Laboratory
Published on: September 6, 2024
Highly efficient methane biocatalysis revealed in a methanotrophic bacterium
M G Kalyuzhnaya1, S Yang, O N Rozova
1Department of Microbiology, University of Washington, Box 355014, Seattle, Washington 98195, USA.
Abstract:
Methane is an essential component of the global carbon cycle and one of the most powerful greenhouse gases, yet it is also a promising alternative source of carbon for the biological production of value-added chemicals. Aerobic methane-consuming bacteria (methanotrophs) represent a potential biological platform for methane-based biocatalysis. Here we use a multi-pronged systems-level approach to reassess the metabolic functions for methane utilization in a promising bacterial biocatalyst. We demonstrate that methane assimilation is coupled with a highly efficient pyrophosphate-mediated glycolytic pathway, which under oxygen limitation participates in a novel form of fermentation-based methanotrophy. This surprising discovery suggests a novel mode of methane utilization in oxygen-limited environments, and opens new opportunities for a modular approach towards producing a variety of excreted chemical products using methane as a feedstock.
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