Your neighbors really matter? Interaction of dehalorespiring microorganisms with other microorganisms

Supervision: Raquel Vargas / Wilfred Röling (room M220)

Tetrachloroethene (PCE) and trichloroetene (TCE) are toxic halogenated compounds with long half lives. This toxicity is often paired with high recalcitrance to degradation, especially in anaerobic environments where they accumulate.
Recently, it was discovered that Desulfitobacterium strains have the capacity to degrade these halogenated compounds in anaerobic environments by using them in a kind of “respiration” (called reductive dechlorination, or dehalorespiration), which converts these pollutants into harmless substances. But what happens if Desulfitobacterium is interacting with other species? Will this lead to mutualistic interactions? competition? Inhibition or stimulation of degradation compared to mono-species cultures? This internship aims to study the PCE  and TCE degradation rate of Desulfitobacterium in response to community interactions.

Techniques used in this study will be:

• Mono- and mixed species culturing under anaerobic conditions.
• Gas Chromatography (GC) measurements.
• Monitoring the community composition by qualitative and quantitative  PCR techniques and/or Fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH).