Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Department of Molecular and Cell Biology, University of California, Berkeley, California, USA.
Department of Environmental Science, Policy, & Management, University of California, Berkeley, California, USA.
mBio. 2024 Sep 11;15(9):e0162324. doi: 10.1128/mbio.01623-24. Epub 2024 Aug 14.
As the closest living relatives of animals, choanoflagellates offer insights into the ancestry of animal cell physiology. Here, we report the isolation and characterization of a colonial choanoflagellate from Mono Lake, California. The choanoflagellate forms large spherical colonies that are an order of magnitude larger than those formed by the closely related choanoflagellate . In cultures maintained in the laboratory, the lumen of the spherical colony is filled with a branched network of extracellular matrix and colonized by bacteria, including diverse Gammaproteobacteria and Alphaproteobacteria. We propose to erect gen. nov., sp. nov. Hake, Burkhardt, Richter, and King to accommodate this extremophile choanoflagellate. The physical association between bacteria and in culture presents a new experimental model for investigating interactions among bacteria and eukaryotes. Future work will investigate the nature of these interactions in wild populations and the mechanisms underpinning the colonization of spheres by bacteria.
The diversity of organisms that live in the extreme environment of Mono Lake (California, USA) is limited. We sought to investigate whether the closest living relatives of animals, the choanoflagellates, exist in Mono Lake, a hypersaline, alkaline, arsenic-rich environment. We repeatedly isolated members of a new species of choanoflagellate, which we have named . Characterization of revealed that it forms large spherical colonies containing diverse co-isolated bacteria, providing an opportunity to investigate mechanisms underlying physical associations between eukaryotes and bacteria.
作为动物最亲近的现存亲属，领鞭毛虫为研究动物细胞生理学的起源提供了线索。在这里，我们报告了一种来自加利福尼亚州莫诺湖的群体领鞭毛虫的分离和特征。这种领鞭毛虫形成的球形群体比密切相关的领鞭毛虫形成的群体大一个数量级。在实验室中维持的培养物中，球形群体的腔充满了分支的细胞外基质网络，并被细菌定植，包括多种γ变形菌和α变形菌。我们建议建立新属，新种 Hake、Burkhardt、Richter 和 King，以容纳这种极端嗜热的领鞭毛虫。在培养物中细菌与之间的物理联系为研究细菌和真核生物之间的相互作用提供了一个新的实验模型。未来的工作将调查这些相互作用在野生种群中的性质以及细菌定殖的机制。
生活在莫诺湖（美国加利福尼亚州）极端环境中的生物多样性有限。我们试图调查动物最亲近的现存亲属领鞭毛虫是否存在于莫诺湖，这是一个高盐、碱性、富含砷的环境。我们反复分离出一种新的领鞭毛虫物种的成员，我们将其命名为 。对 的特征分析表明，它形成了包含多种共分离细菌的大型球形群体，为研究真核生物与细菌之间的物理联系的机制提供了机会。
