title: Volatile Gas Production by Methyl Halide Transferase: An In Situ Reporter Of Microbial Gene Expression In Soil.
abstract: Traditional visual reporters of gene expression have only very limited use in soils because their outputs are challenging to detect through the soil matrix. This severely restricts our ability to study time-dependent microbial gene expression in one of the Earth's largest, most complex habitats. Here we describe an approach to report on dynamic gene expression within a microbial population in a soil under natural water levels (at and below water holding capacity) via production of methyl halides using a methyl halide transferase. As a proof-of-concept application, we couple the expression of this gas reporter to the conjugative transfer of a bacterial plasmid in a soil matrix and show that gas released from the matrix displays a strong correlation with the number of transconjugant bacteria that formed. Gas reporting of gene expression will make possible dynamic studies of natural and engineered microbes within many hard-to-image environmental matrices (soils, sediments, sludge, and biomass) at sample scales exceeding those used for traditional visual reporting.
authors.affiliation: Department of Bioengineering, Rice University , 6100 Main Street, MS 142, Houston, Texas 77005, United States.
authors.forename: Hsiao-Ying
authors.initials: HY
authors.lastname: Cheng
authors.affiliation: Department of Earth Science, Rice University , 6100 Main Street, MS 126, Houston, Texas 77005, United States.|Department of Biosciences, Rice University , 6100 Main Street, MS 140, Houston, Texas 77005, United States.
authors.forename: Caroline A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Masiello
authors.affiliation: Department of Biosciences, Rice University , 6100 Main Street, MS 140, Houston, Texas 77005, United States.|Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Rice University , 6100 Main Street, MS 362, Houston, Texas 77005, United States.
authors.forename: George N
authors.initials: GN
authors.lastname: Bennett
authors.affiliation: Department of Bioengineering, Rice University , 6100 Main Street, MS 142, Houston, Texas 77005, United States.|Department of Biosciences, Rice University , 6100 Main Street, MS 140, Houston, Texas 77005, United States.
authors.forename: Jonathan J
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Silberg
mesh_terms: D018533:Biomass; D064351:Genes, Microbial; D012987:Soil; D012988:Soil Microbiology; D014166:Transferases
chemical_list: D012987:Soil; D014166:Transferases