Life and death of dried prokaryotes.
The removal of water through air drying damages membranes, proteins and nucleic acids and is lethal to the majority of organisms. Nevertheless, some vegetative cells of bacteria and cyanobacteria survive extreme desiccation. Understanding the mechanisms of their desiccation tolerance is an important issue in cell biology and holds promise for the metabolic engineering of desiccation-sensitive cells.
Billi
Daniela
D
Dipartimento di Biologia, Università di Roma Tor Vergata, Rome, Italy. Daniela.Billi@uniroma2.it
Potts
Malcolm
M
D000222:Adaptation, Physiological; D003890:Desiccation / Q000379:methods*; D005818:Genetic Engineering / Q000379:methods; D011387:Prokaryotic Cells / Q000502:physiology*