Abstract
Electricity-generating bacteria have attracted intensive studies in recent years as an important resource for energy generation. In this investigation, a bacterial isolate capable of producing electric current during fermentation processes was obtained from a deep-sea hydrothermal field in the Atlantic Ocean for the first time. The strain, assigned to Shewanella sp. DS1 based on its 16S-rRNA sequence analysis, grew at the optimum temperature of 30°C and optimum pH of 6.5. The results showed that the electric current generated by the strain increased during the first few hours and eventually reached the maximum (0.29 mA) at approximately 15 hours after inoculation. The electric current, however, decreased slowly as time increased. Thus, our study demonstrated that the deep sea promises to be a good reservoir for screening electricity-generating microbes.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Scholz F, Schroder U (2003) Bacterial batteries. Nat Biotechnol 21:1151–1152
Rabaey K, Verstraete W (2005) Microbial fuel cells: Novel biotechnology for energy generation. Trends Biotechnol 23:291–297
Lovley DR (2006) Microbial energizers: Fuel cells that keep on going. Microbe 1:323–327
Lovley DR (2006) Bug juice: Harvesting electricity with microorganisms. Nat Rev Microbiol 7:497–508
Shukla AK, Suresh P, Berchmans S, Rajendran A (2004) Biological fuel cells and their applications. Curr Sci 87:455–468
Holmes DE, Bond DR, O’Neil RA, Reimers CE, Tender LR, Loveley DR (2004) Microbial communities associated with electrodes: Harvesting electricity from a variety of aquatic sediments. Microb Ecol 48:178–190
Delong EF, Chandler P (2002) Power from the deep. Nat Biotechnol 20:788–789
Logan BE, Murano C, Scott K, Gray ND, Head M (2005) Electricity generation from cysteine in a microbial fuel cell. Water Res 39: 942–952
Kim HJ, Park HS, Hyun MS, Chang IS, Kim M, Kim BH (2002) A mediator-less microbial fuel cell using a metal reducing bacterium, Shewanella putrefaciens. Enzyme Microb Technol 30:145–152
Bond DR, Lovley DR (2003) Electricity production by Geobacte sulfurreducens attached to electrodes. Appl Environ Microbiol 69:1548–1555
Liu B, Li H, Wu S, Zhang X, Xie L (2006) Species differentiation and identification of thermophilic bacteria isolated from offing in China and deep sea in Pacific. Can J Microbiol 52:753–758
Ausubel FM, Brent R, Kingston RE (1992) Short protocols in molecular biology. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Acknowledgment
This investigation was financially supported by China Ocean Mineral Resources R & D Association (DY105-02-04-05).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Wei, D., Zhang, X. Current Production by a Deep-Sea Strain Shewanella sp. DS1. Curr Microbiol 55, 497–500 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00284-007-9019-2
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00284-007-9019-2