Environmental genomics: exploring the unmined richness of microbes to degrade xenobiotics

Abstract

Increasing pollution of water and soils by xenobiotic compounds has led in the last few decades to an acute need for understanding the impact of toxic compounds on microbial populations, the catabolic degradation pathways of xenobiotics and the set-up and improvement of bioremediation processes. Recent advances in molecular techniques, including high-throughput approaches such as microarrays and metagenomics, have opened up new perspectives and pointed towards new opportunities in pollution abatement and environmental management. Compared with traditional molecular techniques dependent on the isolation of pure cultures in the laboratory, microarrays and metagenomics allow specific environmental questions to be answered by exploring and using the phenomenal resources of uncultivable and uncharacterized micro-organisms. This paper reviews the current potential of microarrays and metagenomics to investigate the genetic diversity of environmentally relevant micro-organisms and identify new functional genes involved in the catabolism of xenobiotics.

Interaction Between Pesticide and Soil Microorganisms and Their Degradation: A Molecular Approach

“…Most of the xenobiotic-degrading bacteria harbor plasmids which code for catabolic genes. To characterize the appropriate genes and to enhance the process of degradation through improved constructed strains, a proper management is required, and degradation technology is spanning the spectrum from environmental monitoring ultimately to biodegradation as well as bioremediation (Eyers et al 2004 ). Currently, molecular approaches are being used to characterize the nucleic acids of various bacteria from environmental samples (Hurt et al 2001 ).…”

J Microbial Biochem Technol

“…Microarrays and Metagenomics to investigate the genetic diversity of environmentally relevant micro-organisms and identify new functional genes involved in the catabolism of xenobiotics [32].Finally, we outline scenarios for an innovative combination of microarrays with other molecular tools for structure-function analysis of complex microbial communities [33].…”

Advances in monitoring of catabolic genes during bioremediation

“…The search for new functional genes from metagenomic libraries will continue [18] and comprehensive microarrays will need to be updated regularly [9]. The focus on assessment of bioremediation technologies relying on anaerobic processes such as monitored natural attenuation will increase [19,15].…”