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Bacillus halodurans

Classification

Higher order taxa

Bacteria; Pimicutes; Bacilli; Bacillales; Bacillaceae; Bacillus Use NCBI link to find]

Species

NCBI: Taxonomy

Bacillus halodurans

Description and significance

Bacillus halodurans is a Gram-positive rod that usually occurs in long chains. Individually, they are approximately 0.5 µm in length and .3 µm in diameter. They can be aerobic or anaerobic depending on their living conditions and found mainly in water and soil. B. halodurans is alkaliphilic and grows optimally at 37°C in soil. It is motile and spore forming, and originally an unclassified Bacillus strain, until the discovery unique genes that were attributed to its survival to more alkaline environments.

B.halodurans is important in the production of lantibiotics (antibiotics specifically targeting gram-positive bacteria) with its production of bacteriocin and haloduracin. They also possess several useful enzymes with manufacturing. These enzymes are widely in laundry detergents and they include: protease (a protein degrading enzyme), cellulase (cellulose degrading enzyme) and amlyase (starch degrading enzyme). It can also produce keratin degrading enzymes (useful to break down hair and nail proteins) and xylanase, the enyzme used to bleach pulp in paper-making.

Genome structure

B.halodurans contains 112 tanspoase genes, as well as factors belonging to the extracytoplasmic function family. There are 11 factors total and 10 of these are unique to B.halodurans, which could be the reason for its ability to adapt in such alkaline environments. Its genome consists of a single circular chromosome.

Cell structure and metabolism

B.halodurans' cell wall contains peptioglycan (hence gram-positive) its resilience to harsher environments is more dependent on the enzymes and sigma factors produced from its genome. Much of its metabolism involves similar mechanisms to Bacillus subtilus, which consists mostly of fermenting and oxidizing of carbohydrates for energy. B.halodurans possesses 75 ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporteres through its genome to assist in this type of energy expenditure. However, unlike B.subtilus, B.halodurans is known for its glyoxylate shunt (produced from the enzymes from its genome) that allows for the utilization of acetate or fatty acids as its sole source for carbon. This also contributes to its vigilance in more hostile environments.

Ecology

B.halodurans is able to live in a variety of environments, usually found in water or soil. Most research, however, indicates that B.halodurans exists mostly in the laboratory in research for several industrial products. It does not seem to have a significant impact on its environment, but researched for its unique genome structure.

Pathology

There is currently no research on the pathology of B.halodurans, it seems as though it mostly found in industry research with its ability to secrete enzymes.

Current Research / Application to Biotechnology

B.halodurans is a growing interest in the research industry ranging in applications from food preservatives, pesticides, environmental protection, and textiles. It's extended potenital in all of these fields is due to Iss (insertion sequences). Researchers currently have been using B.halodurans this type of protein or enzyme replication in order to have more control over the process. This type of control possess the potential to a type of systematic breeding of enzymes, giving scientists hope for a new future in enzyme production.

B.halodurans sigma factors of the extracytoplasmic function family seem to play a key role in studying bacteria resilience to antibiotics. They are responsible for the sequencing of proteins essential in maintaining the integrity of periplasmic and outer membrane components, thus many are looking into the exact functioning of these factors in order to possibly disrupt that integrety. Since B.halodurans possesses 10 of the 11 sigma factors, it is significant in the understanding of these processes.

It also upcoming in the agricultural and food preservation industry due to its abilty to produce chitinase, a key enzyme that degrades chitin, a key protein in fungal cell wall formations. The enzyme has been found to be able to be housed and replicated through B.halodurans already has promising results in protecting plants from hazardous environmental factors such as adverse sodium concentrations and protecting foods from spoiling in a short period of time.

References

”Bacteria Genomes-BACILLUS HALODUANS.” EMBL-EBI. http://www.ebi.ac.uk/2can/genomes/bacteria/Bacillus_halodurans.html

“Bacillus Halodurans”. ABIS Encyclopedia. http://www.tgw1916.net/Bacillus/halodurans.html

"BACILLUS HALODUANS." National Center for Biotechnology Information. U.S. National Library of Medicine. Web. 10 May 2012. <http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11058132?dopt=Abstract>.

Takami, Hideto; Horikoshi, Koki (1 January 1999). "Reidentification of Facultatively Alkaliphilic Bacillus sp. C-125 to Bacillus halodurans.". Bioscience, Biotechnology, and Biochemistry 63 (5): 943–945.

 Takami, H. (2000). "Complete genome sequence of the alkaliphilic bacterium Bacillus halodurans and genomic sequence comparison with Bacillus subtilis". Nucleic Acids Research 28 (21): 4317–4331.

Danesh, A; Mamo, G, Mattiasson, B (2011 Jul). "Production of haloduracin by Bacillus halodurans using solid-state fermentation.".Biotechnology letters 33 (7): 1339–44.

Edited by student of Dr. Lynn M Bedard, DePauw University http://www.depauw.edu