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Published September 1996 | public
Journal Article

Sulfonates: novel electron acceptors in anaerobic respiration

Abstract

The enrichment and isolation in pure culture of a bacterium, identified as a strain of Desulfovibrio, able to release and reduce the sulfur of isethionate (2-hydroxyethanesulfonate) and other sulfonates to support anaerobic respiratory growth, is described. The sulfonate moiety was the source of sulfur that served as the terminal electron acceptor, while the carbon skeleton of isethionate functioned as an accessory electron donor for the reduction of sulfite. Cysteate (alanine-3-sulfonate) and sulfoacetaldehyde (acetaldehyde-2-sulfonate) could also be used for anaerobic respiration, but many other sulfonates could not. A survey of known sulfate-reducing bacteria revealed that some, but not all, strains tested could utilize the sulfur of some sulfonates as terminal electron acceptor. Isethionate-grown cells of Desulfovibrio strain IC1 reduced sulfonate-sulfur in preference to that of sulfate; however, sulfate-grown cells reduced sulfate-sulfur in preference to that of sulfonate.

Additional Information

© 1996 Springer-Verlag. Received: 2 May 1996; Accepted: 8 June 1996. This study was begun in the Microbial Diversity course at the Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, Mass., USA, when J.R.L. was a student supported by a Bernard Davis Fellowship; it was continued by T.P. in the same course the following summer. Funds from the University of Connecticut Research Foundation, the Institute of Water Resources (U.S. Geological Survey Department of the Interior, grant 14–08–0001-G2009), and Proctor and Gamble made continuation of the study possible. We thank colleagues Jeffrey Dugas and Chih-Ching Chien for their helpful comments.

Additional details

Created:
August 22, 2023
Modified:
October 23, 2023