Trichloromethane dechlorination by a novel Dehalobacter sp. strain 8M reveals a third contrasting C and Cl isotope fractionation pattern within this genus.

Trichloromethane (TCM) is a pollutant frequently detected in contaminated aquifers, and only four bacterial strains are known to respire it. Here, we obtained a novel Dehalobacter strain capable of transforming TCM to dichloromethane, which was denominated Dehalobacter sp. strain 8M.

Author Correction: GlobalFungi, a global database of fungal occurrences from high-throughput-sequencing metabarcoding studies.

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper.

GlobalFungi, a global database of fungal occurrences from high-throughput-sequencing metabarcoding studies.

Fungi are key players in vital ecosystem services, spanning carbon cycling, decomposition, symbiotic associations with cultivated and wild plants and pathogenicity. The high importance of fungi in ecosystem processes contrasts with the incompleteness of our understanding of the patterns of fungal biogeography and the environmental factors that drive those patterns. To reduce this gap of knowledge, we collected and validated data published on the composition of soil fungal communities in terrestrial environments including soil and plant-associated habitats and made them publicly accessible through a user interface at https://globalfungi.

Lignocellulolytic systems of soil bacteria: A vast and diverse toolbox for biotechnological conversion processes.

Lignocellulose from plant biomass represents an abundant and renewable source for the production of environmentally friendly chemicals and biofuels. However, its recalcitrant nature entails the use of complex biochemical reactions that are still challenging. Since the degradation of lignocellulose is the current bottleneck of the conversion processes, the search for novel enzymes and microbial strains for degrading plant biomass is of high importance.

Manganese and iron as structuring parameters of microbial communities in Arctic marine sediments from the Baffin Bay.

The Arctic Baffin Bay between Canada and Greenland is sea ice-covered during the majority of the year, restricting primary production to the summer months. Sediments receive low amounts of mostly terrestrial- and less marine-derived organic matter. To study microbial communities constrained by physicochemical conditions changing with distance from land and ocean depth, we applied high-throughput 16S rRNA gene sequencing and compared sequence diversity with biogeochemical parameters in 40 different sediment samples.

Development and application of primers for the class Dehalococcoidia (phylum Chloroflexi) enables deep insights into diversity and stratification of subgroups in the marine subsurface.

Bacteria of the class Dehalococcoidia (DEH) (phylum Chloroflexi) are widely distributed in the marine subsurface and are especially prevalent in deep marine sediments. Nevertheless, little is known about the specific distributions of DEH subgroups at different sites and depths. This study therefore specifically examined the distributions of DEH through depths of various marine sediment cores by quantitative PCR and pyrosequencing using newly designed DEH 16S rRNA gene targeting primers.