Publications by authors named "Montana L Smith"
Microbial response to changing environmental factors influences the fate of soil organic carbon, and drought has been shown to affect microbial metabolism and respiration. We hypothesized that the access of microbes to different carbon pools in response to dry-rewet events occurs sequentially at different rates. We amended desiccated soils with C-labeled glucose and measured the rates of CO and CO respiration in real time after rewetting.
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- Bacteriophages, which are viruses that infect bacteria, are common in soils, but many remain uncharacterized, and their bacterial hosts are often unknown.
- Using a technique called high-throughput chromosome conformation capture (Hi-C), researchers identified specific phage-host relationships and found that some host bacteria play key roles in soil communities.
- Environmental changes, like soil drying, led to more lysogenic infections (where the virus integrates into the host's DNA) and altered the range of phage hosts, highlighting the complex interactions between phages and bacterial populations in soil ecosystems.
Background: Microbiomes contribute to multiple ecosystem services by transforming organic matter in the soil. Extreme shifts in the environment, such as drying-rewetting cycles during drought, can impact the microbial metabolism of organic matter by altering microbial physiology and function. These physiological responses are mediated in part by lipids that are responsible for regulating interactions between cells and the environment.
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- The study explores the ectorhizosphere of the Setaria plant, a key species for biofuels, focusing on microbial and molecular differences in three accessions grown in nutrient-poor soil.
- Researchers observed specific changes in microbial communities, especially in Actinobacteria and Proteobacteria, which suggested differing responses to nutrient availability among the Setaria accessions.
- Findings also revealed that nutrient addition significantly altered the metabolic profiles of the plants, with increases in nitrogen metabolites and other compounds, providing insights for future plant enhancement and bioengineering in low-nutrient environments.
Real-Time Mass Spectrometry Measurements of Respiration Rates in Biological Systems.
J Am Soc Mass Spectrom
March 2021
Article Synopsis
- Organisms generate energy through aerobic respiration by breaking down organic carbon compounds, which consumes oxygen and produces carbon dioxide and water, reflecting active metabolism.
- Current methods for measuring respiration rates, like infrared gas analyzers, struggle with tracking specific gas isotopomers in real-time.
- To improve this, a real-time mass spectrometry (RTMS) system was developed, allowing rapid and simultaneous measurements of multiple gases across various biological ecosystems, enhancing our understanding of respiratory metabolism.