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Iron transport in the genus Marinobacter

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Abstract

Marinobacter belong to the class of Gammaproteobacteria and these motile, halophilic or halotolerent bacteria are widely distributed throughout the world’s oceans having been isolated from a wide variety of marine environments. They have also been identified as members of the bacterial flora associated with other marine organisms. Here, using a combination of natural products chemistry and genomic analysis, we assess the nature of the siderophores produced by this genus and their potential relationship to phylogeny and lifestyle/ecological niche of this diverse group of organisms. Our analysis shows a wide level of diversity in siderophore based iron uptake systems among this genus with three general strategies: (1) production and utilization of native siderophores in addition to utilization of a variety of exogenous ones, (2) production and utilization of native siderophores only, (3) lack of siderophore production but utilization of exogenous ones. They all share the presence of at least one siderophore-independent iron uptake ABC transport systems of the FbpABC iron metal type and lack the ability for direct transport of ferrous iron. Siderophore production and utilization can be correlated with phylogeny and thus it forms a type of chemotaxonomic marker for this genus.

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Acknowledgments

This work was funded by NOAA Grants #NA04OAR4170038 and NA08OAR4170669, California Sea Grant College Program Project numbers R/CZ-198 and R/CONT-205 and NSF grant CHE-0924313.

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Author notes

  1. Shady A. Amin

    Present address: Center for Environmental Genomics, School of Oceanography, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, 98105, USA

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, San Diego State University, 5500 Campanile Dr, San Diego, CA, 92182-1030, USA

    Shady A. Amin, Dhuha Al Waheeb, Astrid Gärdes & Carl J. Carrano

  2. Scottish Association for Marine Science, Dunstaffnage Marine Laboratory, Oban, Argyll, PA37 1QA, Scotland, UK

    David H. Green

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  1. Shady A. Amin
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Correspondence to Carl J. Carrano.

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Amin, S.A., Green, D.H., Al Waheeb, D. et al. Iron transport in the genus Marinobacter . Biometals 25, 135–147 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10534-011-9491-9

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