HR: 08:30h
AN: B11B-02 INVITED     [Abstracts]
TI: Bacterial Nanowires Facilitate Extracellular Electron Transfer
AU: * Gorby, Y
EM: yuri.gorby@pnl.gov
AF: Pacific Northwest National Lab, MS P7-50, Richland, WA 99352 United States
AB: Dissimilatory metal reducing bacteria, including Shewanella oneidensis and Geobacter sulfurreducens, produce electrically conductive nanowires that facilitate electron transfer to solid phase iron oxides. Nanowires produced by S. oneidensis strain MR-1 are functionalized by decaheme cytochromes MtrC and OmcA that are distributed along the length of the nanowires, as confirmed by immunolocalization experiments using peptide specific antibodies. Mutants lacking MtrC and OmcA produce nanowires that were poorly conductive, are unable to reduce solid phase iron oxides, and do not produce electric current in microbial fuel cells. Although less completely characterized, nanowires are also produced by organisms throughout a broad metabolic spectrum, from sulfate reducing bacteria to oxygenic, phototrophic cyanobacteria. Our research suggests that electrically conductive nanowires may be common throughout the microbial world and may serve as structures for efficient electron transfer and energy dissemination in complex communities such as microbial mats and biofilms.
DE: 0463 Microbe/mineral interactions
DE: 0465 Microbiology: ecology, physiology and genomics (4840)
SC: Biogeosciences [B]
MN: Fall Meeting 2005