Department of Geomicrobiology, Institute of Microbiology, Faculty of Biology, University of Warsaw, Miecznikowa 1, 02-096 Warsaw, Poland.
International Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology in Warsaw, Księcia Trójdena 4, 02-109 Warsaw, Poland.
Molecules. 2022 Apr 8;27(8):2408. doi: 10.3390/molecules27082408.
A significant part of organic carbon found on the earth is deposited as fossil organic matter in the lithosphere. The most important reservoir of carbon is shale rocks enriched with organic matter in the form of kerogen created during diagenesis. The purpose of this study was to analyze whether the bacterial communities currently inhabiting the shale rocks have had any impact on the properties and type of kerogen. We used the shale rock located on the Fore-Sudetic Monocline, which is characterized by oil-prone kerogen type II. We were able to show that shale rock inhabited by bacterial communities are characterized by oxidized and dehydrated kerogen type III (gas-prone) and type IV (nonproductive, residual, and hydrogen-free). Bacterial communities inhabiting shale rock were dominated by heterotrophs of the , , and phyla. Additionally, we detected a number of protein sequences in the metaproteomes of bacterial communities matched with enzymes involved in the oxidative metabolism of aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons, which may potentially contribute to the postdiagenetic oxidation and dehydrogenation of kerogen. The kerogen transformation contributes to the mobilization of fossil carbon in the form of extractable bitumen dominated by oxidized organic compounds.
地球上发现的大量有机碳有一部分以化石有机物质的形式沉积在岩石圈中。碳的最重要储存库是富含有机质的页岩岩石，这些有机质以干酪根的形式存在，是在成岩作用过程中形成的。本研究的目的是分析目前栖息在页岩岩石中的细菌群落是否对干酪根的性质和类型产生了影响。我们使用了位于前苏台德单斜构造上的页岩岩石，其特征是富含 II 型油型干酪根。我们能够表明，栖息有细菌群落的页岩岩石的特点是氧化和脱水的 III 型（产气型）和 IV 型（非生产型、残余型和无氢型）干酪根。栖息在页岩岩石中的细菌群落主要由 、 和 门的异养生物组成。此外，我们在细菌群落的宏蛋白质组中检测到了一些与参与脂肪族和芳香族烃的氧化代谢的酶相匹配的蛋白质序列，这可能有助于干酪根的后生氧化和脱氢作用。干酪根的转化有助于以可萃取沥青为主的化石碳的迁移，其中含有氧化的有机化合物。
