Frontiers in Cell and Developmental Biology (Feb 2016)

Spatio-temporal detection of the Thiomonas population and the Thiomonas arsenite oxidase involved in natural arsenite attenuation processes in the Carnoulès Acid Mine Drainage

  • Agnès eHovasse,
  • Odile eBruneel,
  • Corinne eCasiot,
  • Angélique eDesoeuvre,
  • Julien eFarasin,
  • Marina eHery,
  • Alain eVan Dorsselaer,
  • Christine eCarapito,
  • Florence eArsene-Ploetze

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3389/fcell.2016.00003
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 4

Abstract

Read online

The acid mine drainage (AMD) impacted creek of the Carnoulès mine (Southern France) is characterized by acid waters with a high heavy metal content. The microbial community inhabiting this AMD was extensively studied using isolation, metagenomic and metaproteomic methods, and the results showed that a natural arsenic (and iron) attenuation process involving the arsenite oxidase activity of several Thiomonas strains occurs at this site. A sensitive quantitative Selected Reaction Monitoring (SRM)-based proteomic approach was developed for detecting and quantifying the two subunits of the arsenite oxidase and RpoA of two different Thiomonas groups. Using this approach combined with 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis based on pyrosequencing and FISH, it was established here for the first time that these Thiomonas strains are ubiquitously present in minor proportions in this AMD and that they express the key enzymes involved in natural remediation processes at various locations and time points. In addition to these findings, this study also confirms that targeted proteomics applied at the community level can be used to detect weakly abundant proteins in situ.

Keywords