| Archaea (9) |  |
| Methanogens (15) | |
| Archaea (9) | |
| Methanogens (15) | |
and archaea as exemplified by antibiotic resistance. When a specific bacterium develops a defense against some drug the corresponding gene can pass horizontally to others in the same colony.
He is remembered perhaps best for classifying life into the now-well-accepted domains of bacteria eukaryotes (plants animals fungi and protists) and archaea.
Specifically they will target archaea whose genes have yet to be scrutinized as closely as those from the other domains Goldenfeld said.
They observed certain traits in Archaea that previously only were seen in Bacteria and vice versa. One such trait involves an enzyme that bacteria commonly use for creating space within their protective cell wall
For the first time a group of Archaea was found to encode this potent enzyme and the authors hypothesize that Archaea may deploy it as a defense mechanism against attacking Bacteria.
The second contribution arising from the work was the correct reassignment or binning of data of some 340 million DNA fragments from other habitats to the proper lineage.
The Nature publication Insights into the phylogeny and coding potential of microbial dark matter builds upon a DOE JGI pilot project the Genomic Encyclopedia of Bacteria and Archaea GEBA:
if there was a correlation between the proportions of methanogens in the eight sheep with the highest and lowest recorded methane emissions.
In sheep with low methane emissions they found elevated levels of one particular species of methanogen (Methanosphaera)
while sheep with high methane emissions had elevated levels of another group of methanogens (Methanobrevibacter gottschalkii).
and methanogen abundance across sheep were rather subtle the team reported that the expression levels of genes involved in methane production varied more substantially across sheep suggesting differential gene regulation perhaps controlled by hydrogen concentration in the rumen
The pink-orange of many salt lakes containing Dunaliella is intensified by the presence of archaea fellow single-celled organisms.**
This research concerns methane-forming archaea a group of microbes known as methanogens which live in areas where oxygen is absent.
This innovative work demonstrates the importance of a new global regulatory system in methanogens said William Whitman a professor of microbiology at the University of Georgia who is familiar with the study
Methanogens play a key role in carbon cycling. When plants die some of their biomass is trapped in areas that are devoid of oxygen such as the bottom of lakes.
Methanogens help convert the residual biological material to methane which other organisms convert to carbon dioxide--a product that can be used by plants.
Methanogens also play an important role in agriculture and human health They live in the digestive systems of cattle
Efforts to control methanogens in specific ways may improve feed utilization and enhance the production of meat
Methanogens are additionally a factor in human nutrition. The organisms live in the large intestine where they enhance the breakdown of food.
Some have proposed that restricting this activity of methanogens could help alleviate obesity. The team investigated an ancient type of methanogen Methanocaldococcus jannaschii
which lives in deep-sea hydrothermal vents or volcanoes where environmental conditions mimic those that existed on the early Earth.
Since methanogens developed before oxygen appeared on earth the evidence raises the possibility that thioredoxin-based metabolic regulation could have come into play for managing anaerobic life long before the advent of oxygen.
then another type of bacteria (methanogens) will break it down, releasing the carbon into the atmosphere as methane.
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