Methanobacterium

Methanobacterium
Methanobacterium formicicum
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Archaea
Kingdom: Euryarchaeota
Class: Methanobacteria
Order: Methanobacteriales
Family: Methanobacteriaceae
Genus: Methanobacterium
Kluyver and van Niel 1936
Type species
Methanobacterium formicicum
Schnellen 1947
Species

See text

Synonyms
  • "Bacterium" ("Methanobacterium") (Kluyver & van Niel 1936) Breed et al. 1948

Methanobacterium is a genus of the Methanobacteria class in the Archaea kingdom, which produce methane as a metabolic byproduct.[1] Despite the name, this genus belongs not to the bacterial domain but the archaeal domain (for instance, they lack peptidoglycan in their cell walls).[2] Methanobacterium are nonmotile and live without oxygen,[2] which is toxic to them, and they only inhabit anoxic environments.[3]

A shared trait by all methanogens is their ability to recycle products.[3] They can use the products of metabolic activities occurring during methanogenesis as substrates for the formation of methane.[3] Methanobacterium species typically thrive in environments with optimal growth temperatures ranging from 28 to 40 °C, and in versatile ecological ranges.[4] They are a part of the scientific world that is still relatively unknown, but methanogens are thought to be some of earth's earliest life forms.[4] They do not create endospores when nutrients are limited.[2] They are ubiquitous in some hot, low-oxygen environments, such as anaerobic digesters, wastewater, and hot springs.[5]

  1. ^ Supplemental Information 3: Taxon list extracted from taxonomic sources, with corresponding NCBI taxonomy identifiers by which NCBI sequence accessions were filtered. PeerJ (Report). doi:10.7717/peerj.15163/supp-3.
  2. ^ a b c Whitman WB, ed. (14 September 2015). Bergey's Manual of Systematics of Archaea and Bacteria (1st ed.). Wiley. doi:10.1002/9781118960608.gbm00495. ISBN 978-1-118-96060-8.
  3. ^ a b c Schaechter M (2009). Encyclopedia of microbiology (3rd ed.). Amsterdam Boston: Elsevier/Academic Press. ISBN 978-0-12-373944-5.
  4. ^ a b Lv Z, Ding J, Wang H, Wan J, Chen Y, Liang L, et al. (October 2022). "Isolation of a Novel Thermophilic Methanogen and the Evolutionary History of the Class Methanobacteria". Biology. 11 (10): 1514. doi:10.3390/biology11101514. PMC 9598358. PMID 36290418.
  5. ^ Wasserfallen A, Nölling J, Pfister P, Reeve J, Conway de Macario E (January 2000). "Phylogenetic analysis of 18 thermophilic Methanobacterium isolates supports the proposals to create a new genus, Methanothermobacter gen. nov., and to reclassify several isolates in three species, Methanothermobacter thermautotrophicus comb. nov., Methanothermobacter wolfeii comb. nov., and Methanothermobacter marburgensis sp. nov". International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology. 50 (1): 43–53. doi:10.1099/00207713-50-1-43. PMID 10826786.