Origin and novel transport pathways of bacterial hopanoids

Hopanoids are bacterial lipids that fortify membranes and enhance stress resistance. Derivatives of hopanoids known as "geo-hopanes" are abundant signatures of ancient bacteria in sediments, yet there are conflicting views on whether they are markers of specific taxa or environments. Here we analyze conservation of hopanoid biosynthesis across bacterial genomes using modern taxonomic tools. We find that hopanoids most likely originated in an ancestor of the pseudomonadota, and that tolerance of high osmolarity is the most common feature of hopanoid-producing strains. Additionally, microsynteny with hopanoid-related loci revealed new hopanoid-associated gene families, which we term hpnT and hpnS. Structural predictions and the restriction of these gene families to diderms suggests they participate in hopanoid trafficking, potentially forming a pathway analogous to Mla proteins in E. coli.