Discoveries with Roseobacteraceae: Bacterial Models for Ocean Heterotrophy

The molecular revolution of the 1990s brought insights into the tremendous breadth of ecological and evolutionary diversity harbored within the bacterial and archaeal domains of life, enabling scientists to peer into the proverbial microbial black box. Many of these early molecular efforts focused on microbes in marine surface waters, given their global relevance and ease of extraction from seawater via filtration. From molecular surveys of marine microbial communities, there emerged a limited number of taxa with marked numerical dominance and distribution across ocean realms. One of these lineages is the now well-studied Roseobacteraceae family. Three decades of studying roseobacter members, many of which are amenable to both laboratory culture and genetic manipulation, have led to discoveries in how microbial heterotrophs process diverse marine organic matter, drive biogeochemical cycles, and interact with primary producers.