Novel Molecular Biological Tools to Visualize Bacteria Involved in Heavy Metal and Radionuclide Transformations(ABSTRACT)

摘要

During the last decade our concept of the capability of microbial species to reduce heavy metals has expanded. Many of the so far recognized microbial species show several interesting capabilities for different biotechnological applications including bioremediation of heavy metals, radionuclides, chloro-organic substances, and microbial fuel cell technology. For an intelligent bioremediation design and full understanding of complex microbial ecological interactions, reliable and quick analytical tools for real time in situ detection of target cells and their activities are needed. This is mostly achieved by nucleic acid based methods like PCR. However such methods cannot visualize their targets and thus fail to provide relevant information about the morphology, distribution and association of the targeted species. Unfortunately, few efforts have been made to develop modern microscopical based methods to visualize bacteria involved in heavy metal- and radionuclide transformations. Here, we report our efforts to complement this drawback by exploring the usefulness of whole-cell-targeted tools using fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) and microscopy.