Global transcriptional response of Methylorubrum extorquens to formaldehyde stress expands the role of EfgA and is distinct from antibiotic translational inhibition.

*Bazurto, JV, *Riazi S, D’Alton S, Deatherage DE, Bruger EL, Barrick JE, Marx CJ. Global transcriptional response of Methylorubrum extorquens to formaldehyde stress expands the role of EfgA and is distinct from antibiotic translational inhibition. Microorganisms. 9:347 (2021). doi.org/10.3390/microorganisms9020347

Formaldehyde-responsive proteins, TtmR and EfgA, reveal a tradeoff between formaldehyde resistance and efficient transition to methylotrophy in Methylorubrum extorquens.

Bazurto JV, Bruger EL, Lee JA, Lambert LB, Marx CJ. Formaldehyde-responsive proteins, TtmR and EfgA, reveal a tradeoff between formaldehyde resistance and efficient transition to methylotrophy in Methylorubrum extorquens. Journal of Bacteriology. 203:e00589-20 (2021). doi.org10.1128/JB.00589-20

EfgA is a conserved formaldehyde sensor that leads to bacterial growth arrest in response to elevated formaldehyde.

Bazurto JV, Nayak DD, Ticak T, Davlieva M, Lee JA, Hellenbrand CN, Lambert LB, Benski OJ, Quates CJ, Johnson JL, Patel, JS, Ytreberg FM, Shamoo Y, Marx CJ. EfgA is a conserved formaldehyde sensor that leads to bacterial growth arrest in response to elevated formaldehyde. PLOS Biology. 19:e3001208 (2021). [pdf] doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3001208

Genetic context significantly influences the maintenance and evolution of degenerate pathways.

Bruger EL, Chubiz LM, Rojas Echenique JI, Renshaw CJ, Espericueta V, Draghi JA, Marx CJ. Genetic context significantly influences the maintenance and evolution of degenerate pathways. Genome Biology and Evolution. 13 (2021). [pdf]  doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evab082

Methylothon

Ceci Martinez-Gomez, Jessica Lee, and I have begun a new outreach effort as part of our NSF Dimensions of Biodiversity project (). We call this the Methylothon: a multi-way competition between natural isolates of Methylobacterium collected by high school students, so far having been run…

MicrobialEvolution

MicrobialEvolution.org A forum for exchange and discussion amongst educators and students in microbial evolution Why?It is easy to find an evolution textbook and many of us have taken one (or many) classes. Same for microbiology… But microbial evolution? It is a burgeoning field with a dearth…

DOE Biosystems Project

Using Gene Editing and an Accumulated Bioproduct as a Reporter for Genotypic and Phenotypic Heterogeneity in Growth-vs-Production for Methylobacterium extorquens Conversion of Aromatics to Butanol Christopher J. Marx,1 Ankur B. Dalia,2 Sergey Stolyar,1 Andreas E. Vasdekis,1 1University of Idaho, Moscow, ID; 2Indiana University, Bloomington, IN Project Goals: With a unique capacity…

New paper by Eric Bruger shows how beneficial mutations can affect the ability for multiple metabolic pathways to coexist

Congrats to Eric Bruger and his coauthors for his new paper in Genome Biology and Evolution that built upon our old work on epistatic interactions between beneficial mutations (Chou et al., 2011. Science) to show that beneficial mutations can also be key in how new…

New paper describing the formaldehyde sensor EfgA is out in PLOS Biology, and two more from Jannell Bazurto expanding upon its role

After a long period of work and many contributions from collaborators and many people within the lab our discovery of the formaldehyde sensor EfgA came out in a paper in PLOS Biology. This work, led by Jannell Bazurto (now faculty at University of Minnesota) and…