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Adaptation of aquatic microbial communities to pollutant stress
1US Environmental Protection Agency, Environmental Research Laboratory, Gulf Breeze, FL 32561.
Microbiological Sciences
|June 1, 1988
Abstract:
The importance of microbial adaptation in the removal of environmental pollutants and in maintaining active microbial communities in impacted ecosystems is discussed using the biodegradation of p-nitrophenol and the volatilization of mercuric mercury as examples. A molecular mechanism of adaptation is suggested by enrichment of mercury resistance (mer) genes in some communities upon exposure to mercury.