Iron is an essential nutrient for living things, but is scarce in the ocean. Darwin Project researchers Stephanie Dutkiewisz, Mick Follows and Fanny Monteiro, collaborating with a team from WHOI led by Mak Saito are reporting they have found that a key marine bacterium, Crocosphaera watsonii, may have evolved a remarkable biochemical way to recycle iron for dual metabolic activities. You can read more about this work in the following WHOI News Office release or in Saito et al (2011), a recent paper in PNAS.
Category Archives: Nitrogen Fixation
Publication
Saito, M. A., E . M. Bertrand, S. Dutkiewicz, V. V. Bulygin, D. M. Moran, F. M. Monteiro, M. J. Follows, F. W. Valois, and J. B. Waterbury (2011), Iron conservation by reduction of metalloenzyme inventories in the marine diazotroph Crocosphaera watsonii.
Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1006943108
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Monteiro, F., M. J. Follows and S. Dutkiewicz (2010), Distribution of diverse nitrogen fixers in the global ocean, Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 24, GB3017, doi:10.1029/2009GB003731
Publication
Monteiro, F. and M. Follows (2009), On the interannual variability of nitrogen fixation in the subtropical gyres, Journal of Marine Research, 67, 1-20, doi: 10.1357/002224009788597944