Bacteria from hydrocarbon seep areas growing on short-chain alkanes.

Marine hydrocarbon seeps introduce large amounts of organic carbon into the environment. Different microorganisms inhabit these unusual environments using the hydrocarbons as an energy source. A recent paper by Kniemeyer et al. shows, for the first time, that sulfate-reducing bacteria isolated from hydrocarbon seeps can oxidize short-chain hydrocarbons anaerobically. This finding is an important contribution to our understanding of the role of microbes in the recycling of chemically inactive carbon compounds.