Rhodococcus

Rhodococcus
Rhodococcus sp.
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Bacteria
Phylum: Actinomycetota
Class: Actinomycetia
Order: Mycobacteriales
Family: Nocardiaceae
Genus: Rhodococcus
Zopf 1891
Type species
Rhodococcus rhodochrous
(Zopf 1891) Tsukamura 1974 (Approved Lists 1980)
Species

See text.

Synonyms[1]
  • "Prescottella" Jones et al. 2013
  • "Prescottia" Jones et al. 2013
  • "Spelaeibacter" Kim et al. 2022

Rhodococcus is a genus of aerobic, nonsporulating, nonmotile Gram-positive bacteria closely related to Mycobacterium and Corynebacterium.[2][3] While a few species are pathogenic, most are benign, and have been found to thrive in a broad range of environments, including soil, water, and eukaryotic cells. Some species have large genomes, including the 9.7 megabasepair genome (67% G/C) of Rhodococcus sp. RHA1.[4]

Strains of Rhodococcus are important owing to their ability to catabolize a wide range of compounds and produce bioactive steroids, acrylamide, and acrylic acid, and their involvement in fossil fuel biodesulfurization.[4] This genetic and catabolic diversity is not only due to the large bacterial chromosome, but also to the presence of three large linear plasmids.[2] Rhodococcus is also an experimentally advantageous system owing to a relatively fast growth rate and simple developmental cycle, but is not well characterized.[4]

Another important application of Rhodococcus comes from bioconversion, using biological systems to convert cheap starting material into more valuable compounds, such as its ability to metabolize harmful environmental pollutants, including toluene, naphthalene, herbicides, and PCBs. Rhodococcus species typically metabolize aromatic substrates by first oxygenating the aromatic ring to form a diol (two alcohol groups). Then, the ring is cleaved with intra/extradiol mechanisms, opening the ring and exposing the substrate to further metabolism. Since the chemistry is very stereospecific, the diols are created with predictable chirality. While controlling the chirality of chemical reaction presents a significant challenge for synthetic chemists, biological processes can be used instead to faithfully produce chiral molecules in cases where direct chemical synthesis is not feasible or efficient. An example of this is the use of Rhodococcus to produce chiral indandiol derivatives which serve as synthetic intermediates for indinavir, a protease inhibitor used in the treatment of HIV/AIDS.[5]

The conversion of indene to trans-1R,2R-indandiol and cis-1S,2R-indandiol by Rhodococcus sp.[6]
  1. ^ Euzéby JP, Parte AC. "Rhodococcus". List of Prokaryotic names with Standing in Nomenclature (LPSN). Retrieved June 25, 2022.
  2. ^ a b van der Geize R. & L. Dijkhuizen (2004). "Harnessing the catabolic diversity of rhodococci for environmental and biotechnological applications". Microbiology. 7 (3): 255–261. doi:10.1016/j.mib.2004.04.001. hdl:11370/a1dfa0fd-dd65-4c1d-b9b4-bfa98038dcbe. PMID 15196492.
  3. ^ Burkovski A., ed. (2008). Corynebacteria: Genomics and Molecular Biology. Caister Academic Press. ISBN 978-1-904455-30-1. [1].
  4. ^ a b c McLeod MP, Warren RL, Hsiao WW, Araki N, Mihre M, Fernandes C, Miyazawa D, Wong W, Lillquist AL, Wang D, Dosanjh M, Hara H, Petrescu A, Morin RD, Yang G, Stott JM, Schein JE, Shin H, Smailus D, Siddiqui AS, Marra MA, Jones SJ, Holt R, Brinkman FS, Miyauchi K, Fukuda M, Davies JE, Mohn WW, Eltis LD (October 17, 2006). "The complete genome of Rhodococcus sp. RHA1 provides insights into a catabolic powerhouse". PNAS. 103 (42): 15582–15587. Bibcode:2006PNAS..10315582M. doi:10.1073/pnas.0607048103. PMC 1622865. PMID 17030794.
  5. ^ Treadway, S.L., K.S. Yanagimachi, E. Lankenau, P.A. Lessard, G. Stephanopoulos and A.J. Sinskey (1999). "Isolation and characterization of indene bioconversion genes from Rhodococcus strain I24". Appl. Microbiol. Biotechnol. 51 (6): 786–793. doi:10.1007/s002530051463. PMID 10422226. S2CID 6264248.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  6. ^ Buckland, Barry C.; Drew, Stephen W.; Connors, Neal C.; Chartrain, Michel M.; Lee, Chanyong; Salmon, Peter M.; Gbewonyo, Kodzo; Zhou, Weichang; Gailliot, Pat; Singhvi, Rahul; Olewinski, Roger C.; Sun, Wen-Jun; Reddy, Jayanthi; Zhang, Jinyou; Jackey, Barbara A.; Taylor, Colleen; Goklen, Kent E.; Junker, Beth; Greasham, Randolph L. (January 1999). "Microbial Conversion of Indene to Indandiol: A Key Intermediate in the Synthesis of CRIXIVAN". Metabolic Engineering. 1 (1): 63–74. doi:10.1006/mben.1998.0107. PMID 10935755.