Delineation of Steroid-Degrading Microorganisms through Comparative Genomic Analysis
To date, the genetics and biochemistry of microbial steroid degradation have mainly been studied in a few model bacteria. By analyzing the genomes of over 8000 organisms, we defined the taxonomic distribution of the metabolic pathways and identified several novel steroid-degrading bacterial groups, including ones from marine environments. In several cases, we confirmed bioinformatic predictions of metabolism in cultures. This study greatly expands our ecological and evolutionary understanding of microbial steroid metabolism and provides a basis for better exploiting this metabolism for biotechnology.
Principal Investigator: Dr. William Mohn
Collaborators & Affiliations: UBC Microbiology and Immunology, LSI, Lee Bergstrand, Erick Cardenas, Johannes Holert, Jonathan Van Hamme, Thompson Rivers University
doi: 10.1128/mBio.00166-16