Bacillus infernus sp. nov., an Fe(III)- and Mn(IV)-Reducing Anaerobe from the Deep Terrestrial Subsurface

Abstract

Bacillus infernus sp. nov. was isolated from ca. 2,700 m below the land surface in the Taylorsville Triassic Basin in Virginia. B. infernus was a strict anaerobe that grew on formate or lactate with Fe(III), MnO,, trimethylamine oxide, or nitrate (reduced to nitrite) as an electron acceptor, and it also grew fermentatively on glucose. Type strain TH-23 and five reference strains were gram-positive rods that were thermophilic (growth occurred at 61"C), halotolerant (good growth occurred in the presence of Na+ concentrations up to 0.6 M), and very slightly alkaliphilic (good growth occurred at pH 7.3 to 7.8). A phylogenetic analysis of its 16s rRNA indicated that B. infernus should be classified as a new species of the genus Bacilius. B. infernus is the only strictly anaerobic species in the genus Bacillus.

Description of Two New Thermophilic Desulfotomaculum spp., Desulfotomaculum putei sp. nov., from a Deep Terrestrial Subsurface, and Desulfotomaculum luciae sp. nov., from a Hot Spring

“…The samples were immediately placed in a chamber containing an inert atmosphere, pared to remove the potentially contaminated surface portions, and then shipped on ice to a laboratory within 24 h (10). The samples were inoculated into enrichment cultures for a variety of bacterial physiological groups, and predominantly anaerobic thermophilic bacteria, including fermentative, iron-reducing, sulfate-reducing, and denitrifying bacteria, grew (5,6). The possibility that the organisms might be the result of contamination during the drilling and sampling process was eliminated by several lines of evidence (2,5,10).…”

Understanding and Enhancing Soil Biological Health: The Solution for Reversing Soil Degradation

“…Biological activity of microorganisms can proceed at environmental extremes including temperatures below freezing and above boiling, at pH approaching acid and alkaline endpoints, under very low water tensions, at very high ionic strength, in high radiation fields, and in the presence of high concentrations of toxic compounds. Viable bacteria have been retrieved from 2 miles below the earth's surface [56]; in fact, the existence of a sterile location on earth is difficult to prove.…”

Three manganese oxide-rich marine sediments harbor similar communities of acetate-oxidizing manganese-reducing bacteria

“…Although a large number of microorganisms capable of manganese reduction is known , many of these were isolated as iron reducers from environments dominated by iron reduction and were only subsequently shown to reduce manganese oxides in culture. The few species that have been enriched and isolated with manganese oxide include Shewanella putrefaciens MR1 from marine sediment and the thermophile Bacillus infernus isolated from terrestrial subsurface (Burdige and Nealson, 1985;Myers and Nealson, 1988;Boone et al, 1995). Manganese reduction is rarely tested in the description of new species, so that this capability might be more widespread in existing isolates than is currently known.…”