INL - Microbial Metabolic Systems

Scientific Signatures

Microbial Metabolic Systems

A number of potentially useful microbes can produce energy and water, transform chemicals, and break down materials. While there are more bacteria on earth than stars in the Milky Way, most of these organisms have not been developed or studied. To tap this tremendous potential, INL is building critical capabilities in microbiology and modeling to harness promising microbes. INL aims to be a leader in understanding, predicting, and controlling microbial metabolic systems. While the primary goal of the Microbial Metabolic Systems Signature is to cultivate microbiological resources to address the nation's energy challenges, ongoing efforts to characterize and engineer microbes will help grow expertise in developing a number of other bioprocesses. Tailored microbes can be used to meet a number of national and global needs, including biomass processing, anti-corrosion treatments, mineral extraction, enhanced oil recovery, bioweapons detection and decontamination, carbon sequestration, improved geothermal energy systems, water treatment, and bioremediation.

Research Capabilities

The Microbial Metabolic Systems Signature hosts robust microbiological capabilities, forming the basis of a growing research core in systems biology. Systems biology is concerned with characterizing microbial metabolisms - how they are coded at the genetic level, expressed as proteins, put to work as enzymes, and interact on the scale of full ecosystems. At INL, researchers are building capabilities to model, sequence, analyze, and tailor the genes, proteins, and metabolism of microbes. This growing capacity for predictive biology and molecular biotechnology allows INL researchers to genetically fine-tune microorganisms, primarily bacteria, for large-scale applications.

Expertise

The Microbial Metabolic Systems signature features an interdisciplinary team of microbiologists with extensive expertise in extremophile microbiology, molecular biology, systems biology, enzymology, and biochemical engineering. The interdisciplinary team structure allows highly effective technology development, spanning the entire innovation cycle from bench to scale-up and application. The group has a long history of applied research and productive working relationships with industrial partners.

Facilities

Parallel computing resources support the laboratory's growing research expertise in bioinformatics, protein structure visualization, and biochemical network modeling. The laboratory also houses a full complement of microbiological research tools, including high-throughput DNA and protein sequencers, mass spectrometers, microarray assays to measure gene expression, and PCR instruments.

Characteristic Research Effort: Processing Biomass

One of the nation's greatest potential sources of energy is ethanol produced from biomass, biological material from plant matter. But breaking down the tough lignocellulose in biomass sources like corn stover, rice hulls, sawmill waste, and switchgrass is energy intensive. To make ethanol production more efficient, INL microbiologists are working to characterize and control high-temperature, acid-loving bacteria isolated from Yellowstone National Park. The bacteria produce complex and novel enzymes ideal for processing lignocellulose.

Collaborations

In addition to in-house capabilities, INL is also building collaborations and partnerships with other research organizations. The laboratory is a founding member of the Yellowstone National Park Metagenomics Working Group, along with the Venter Institute, DOE's Joint Genome Institute, and Montana State University's Thermal Biology Institute. Researchers are also working with industry to develop "Xtreme Xylanase", an award-winning high temperature and acid stable enzyme, to process biomass on a large scale.

Selected Publications/Presentations

Reed, D.W.; Barnes, J.M.; Permann,C.J.; Schaller, K. D.; Newby, D.T.; and Thompson, V.S., 2007. "Proteomic investigation of the hydrogen producing thermophilic Carboxydothermus hydrogenoformans grown with CO and syngas", poster presented at the 55th American Society for Mass Spectrometry Conference on Mass Spectrometry and Allied Topics, Indianapolis, IN, June 3-7.
Thompson, D.N, Thompson, V.S., Schaller, K.D., and Apel, W.A. 2007. Thermal and acid stable hemicellulase and cellulase and their role in producing energy from biomass. Invited presentation at Society for Industrial Microbiology Annual meeting, Denver, CO, July 29-Aug 2.
Robb, Frank. T. and D.T. Newby. 2006. Functional Genomics in Thermophilic Microorganisms. In Extremophiles, Eds. Gerday, C. and N. Glandsdorff. ASM Press.