Carboxydothermus hydrogenoformans

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iCarboxydothermus hydrogenoformans
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Bacteria Phylum: Firmicutes Class: Clostridia Order: Clostridiales Family: Peptococcaceae Genus: Carboxydothermus Species: C. hydrogenoformans
Binomial name
Carboxydothermus hydrogenoformans Svetlichny 1991

Carboxydothermus hydrogenoformans is an extremely thermophilic anaerobic Gram-positive bacterium that has the interesting property of producing hydrogen as a waste product while feeding on carbon monoxide and water.

It was isolated from a hot spring on the Russian volcanic island of Kunashir by Svetlichny et al. in 1991. Its complete genome was sequenced in 2005 by a team of scientists of the Institute for Genomic Research (TIGR).

According to TIGR evolutionary biologist Jonathan Eisen, "C. hydrogenoformans is one of the fastest-growing microbes that can convert water and carbon monoxide to hydrogen." The microbe owes this to the fact that it has at least five different forms of carbon monoxide dehydrogenase.

[edit] External links

• Carboxydothermus hydrogenoformans at PubMed
• Carboxydothermus hydrogenoformans at dsmz.de
• V.A. Svetlichny, T.G. Sokolova, M. Gerhardt, M. Ringpfeil, N.A. Kostrikina and G.A. Zavarzin Carboxydothermus hydrogenoformans gen. nov., sp. nov., a CO-utilizing thermophilic anaerobic bacterium from hydrothermal environmenta of Kunashir Island. Syst. Appl. Microbiol. 14 (1991), pp. 254–260.