Nüsslein Lab News

August 2006 Congratulations to Lisa Stout, Ph.D.! On August 18, Lisa Stout successfully defended her Ph.D. thesis titled "Influence of Plant-associated Microbial Communities on Heavy Metal Uptake by the Aquatic Plant Lemna minor". Congratulations Lisa!

August 2006 Congratulations to Ph.D. candidate Javier Izquierdo! Javier has been selected to received a Lotta M. Crabtree Fellowship for the Fall semester of 2006. Javier was chosen for this award based on his current research and academic achievement. Best wishes to him as he continues his exciting studies.

June 2006 Congratulations to Microbiology Graduate Student Patricia Waldron! Patricia has successfully completed her M.S. in collaboration with the Biogeochemistry Lab at the Department of Geosciences working on salinity gradients as controls on Archaea community structure in the methane-generating zone of the Antrim Shale, and will enter the Ph.D. program at the University of Oklahoma in Fall 2006. Below is the abstract of Patricia's presentation the American Society for Microbiology meeting in May 2006. Salinity of pore water affects microbial growth and diversity in subsurface shale The Antrim Shale of the Michigan Basin (Michigan, USA) is a ~360 million year old sedimentary rock currently under intense development for natural gas production. Geochemical and stable isotope ratio analyses of harvested gas indicate that methane produced from the Antrim is mainly the product of subsurface microbial methanogenesis. Molecular (16S and mcrA) community analysis of waters from Antrim natural gas wells shows a diversity of methanogenic, acetogenic and fermentative organisms. Methane generation varies in mode and intensity across the study area coincident with a steep salinity gradient in shale porewaters. Measured Antrim porewater increases from <10 mM Cl- to >4 M Cl- over a lateral distance of 40 kilometers. This study examines if pore water salinity is a key factor influencing the types of microorganisms and thus the rates and mechanisms of methane generation in the shale. A suite of growth media was established that mimics the pore water chemistry of the shale, ranging from 20 – 4000 mM Cl-. This suite was inoculated with water from productive methane wells sampled along a north-south transect of the study area. Incubations from the majority of wells exhibited growth within six months at salinities between 20 – 1000 mM Cl-. No growth was observed in incubations from the most saline sampled well (3490 mM Cl-), but the second most saline well (2268 mM Cl-) showed growth between up to 1500 mM Cl-; this well exhibits growth at higher salinity than other wells, indicating that a community is present in this well that is distinct from other wells. Maximum methane generation occurs at different salinities for each well, correlating to individual porewater salinities. RFLP analysis of Archaeal 16S rNA genes amplified from well waters indicates that similar RFLP patterns correlate with similar well geochemistries, indicating a suite of methane-generating microbial communities in this environment, each adapted to particular environment characteristics within this sedimentary basin. This research shows that pore water salinity is an important factor controlling methanogenic diversity in susburface shale in the Antrim Shale.

May 2006 The Nüsslein Lab at the American Society for Microbiology General Meeting, The following members of the Nüsslein Lab have just come back from presenting their research at the 2006 ASM General Meeting.

	N-006 Javier Izquierdo and Klaus Nüsslein Soil Microbial Communities Involved in the Nitrogen Cycle at the Aggregate Scale
	N-019 Caryl Becerra and Klaus Nüsslein Flask Microcosm Studies of Microbial Sulfate Reduction Contributing to the Natural Attenuation of Acid Mine Drainage at Davis Mine, Rowe, Massachusetts
	N-029 Patricia Waldron and Klaus Nüsslein Salinity of Pore Water Affects Microbial Growth and Diversity in Subsurface Shale
	N-091 Vicente Gómez and Klaus Nüsslein Soil Microbial Diversity across a Recently Impacted Thermal Site in the Kilauea Hawaiian Volcano Park
	N-209 Lisa Stout and Klaus Nüsslein Bacterial Contribution to Cadmium Accumulation in the Aquatic Plant Lemna minor

November 2005 The Nüsslein Lab at the Soil Science Society of America Meeting, The following members of the Nüsslein Lab have just come back from presenting their research at the 2005 ASA-CSSA-SSSA International Annual Meetings.

	85-6 Vicente Gómez-Alvarez and Klaus Nüsslein Microbial Diversity on Volcanoes: Comparative Microbial Community Analysis and the Relationship with Soil Properties in Recent Hawaiian Volcanic Deposits (<300 Yr Old)
	273-6 Javier Izquierdo and Klaus Nüsslein Nitrogen Processes of Soil Prokaryotic Communities at the Scale of Aggregate Fractions and Individual Microaggregates in Response to Tillage
	275-5 Lauren M. Lebrun, Javier Izquierdo, and Klaus Nüsslein Temporal Comparison of Tillage Effect on Nitrogen-Fixing Communities across Aggregate Size Classes.

October 2005 Klaus Nüsslein at the Science for Sustainable Water Resources Conference Dr. Klaus Nüsslein will convene a session at the upcoming conference Research to Practice: Science for Sustainable Water Resources. Under “Critical Contaminants” the session is entitled Heavy Metals, and features the speakers Dr. Jackie Zhang (Examination of Cellular Response of Biofilms to Copper Contamination), Dr. Richard Vachet(Chemical Insight into the Effect of Speciation on Copper Toxicity in Natural Waters), and Dr. Mark Hines (Dynamics of Bacterially-Mediated Formation, Degradation, and Accumulation of Methylmercury).

June 2005 The Nüsslein Lab at the Boston Bacterial Meeting

Javier Izquierdo has just returned from presenting a talk titled "Micro-scale separation of microbial communities involved in the nitrogen cycle across soil aggregate fractions" at the 2005 Boston Bacterial Meeting at Harvard University.

May 2005 New publication from the Nüsslein Lab In the May 2005 issue of Applied and Environmental Microbiology you willfind a new publication from the Nüsslein Lab by Lisa Stout and Klaus Nüsslein titled Shifts in Rhizoplane Communities of Aquatic Plants Following Cadmium Exposure. Click here to read the abstract and to download the article.

March 2005 NSF Grant awarded to the Nüsslein Lab From the Microbiology Department News Klaus Nüsslein was recently awarded a new 3 year grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) Research in Biogeosciences Program for a research project entitled "Active Subsurface Methanogenesis And Anaerobic Organic Matter Decomposition In A Devonian Black Shale". This work was submitted in collaboration with Dr. Steven Petsch from the Department of Geoscience. Drs. Nüsslein and Petsch will co-convene a session at next years Annual Meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU Spring 2005) on " Microbial Activity in Sedimentary Basins: Origins, Processes and Biogeochemical Impacts". Further presentations of new results are scheduled at the American Society for Microbiology Annual Conference in June as well as at the Joint International Symposium for Subsurface Microbiology and Environmental Biogeochemistry Conference in August.

December 2004 The Nüsslein Lab on the cover of the Journal of Polymer Science From the Microbiology Department News Klaus Nüsslein, in collaboration with researchers from the Department of Polymer Sciences, recently published an article in the Journal of Polymer Science entitled "Nonhemolytic Abiogenic Polymers as Antimicrobial Peptide Mimics". The authors were invited tocreate an image for the cover page of this journal to underscore the importance of their work. The full citation is Arnt, L., K. Nüsslein, and G. N. Tew. Journal of Polymer Science Part A: Polymer Chemistry, Vol. 42, 3860-3864 (2004).

October 2004 Full Patent established After many negotiations our provisional patent for a Microbial Cell Detector (link to News below about Langmuir paper) was finally created through the UMass Office for Commercial Ventures and Intellectual Property under K. Nüsslein, J. Penelle, and K. Das. August (2002) “Surfaces That Selectively Bind To Moieties”. Full patent was assigned under U.S. Serial Number 10/795,703.

January 2004 The Nüsslein Lab in the UMass News Read about Klaus Nüsslein's experience teaching the "Molecular Microbial Ecology Approaches to Bioremediation Techniques" (read below, Nüsslein Lab News from August 2003) in the following news release from the College of Natural Resources and the Environment .

September 2003 New group members - Welcome Teresa Conneely Teresa joined our group in the Fall of 2003 to start as a graduate student in the Ph.D. program. She came from a six year industrial position at Astra-Zeneca. Her research project will be on microbial use of natural organic matter in drinking water supplies. In the early 1970s natural organic matter became a focus of concern as its central role in the formation of potentially carcinogenic disinfection byproducts was recognized. Disinfection byproducts were found to result from the reaction of chlorine with natural organic matter. In addition, it is recognized that natural organic matter contributes to the growth of bacteria in distribution systems. Biodegradable dissolved organic matter (BDOM) in raw waters is supplemented by newly formed BDOM in treated waters to provide stimulus for microbial growth. Different watershed are known to result in waters with different levels of BDOM, however the factors that lead to these differences are not understood. The initial objectives of Teresa’s research are to investigate sources, nature, and long-term variability of that part of natural organic matter in source waters that microorganisms can biodegrade and/or assimilate. Later, she will try to develop better tools to determine microbial activity on these fractions and to evaluate their impact on the formation of disinfection byproducts. This work is funded by the American Water Works Association Research Foundation and overseen by the US-EPA.

August 2003 "Molecular Microbial Ecology Approaches to Bioremediation Techniques" Workshop at USP, Brazil- August 18 to August 28, 2003 After winning a ASM International Professorship grant from the American Society for Microbiology, Dr. Nüsslein and graduate student Cristine Barreto traveled to the University of São Paulo, Brazil to teach a two week intensive workshop on “Molecular Microbial Ecology Approaches to Bioremediation Techniques”. The course accompanied by an extensive 80 page handbook taught the use of modern microbial ecology techniques such as - DNA extraction techniques - Diversity analysis by RFLP (Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism) of 16S rDNA marker genes - Community composition by clone libraries based on 16S rDNA marker genes - Community profiling by DGGE (Denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis) - In situ detection of individual community members by FISH (Fluorescent in situ hybridization) - Demonstration of nucleotide sequencing (at the University of Sao Paulo Campinas campus) All methods were tested on samples that were collected during a site visit at a highly contaminated industrial waste site (chlorinated organic compounds). To ensure an efficient learning experience the course was limited to 16 graduate students from different universities and institutes in Brazil. Guest lectures, journal discussions and intensive collaboration with knowledgeable members of the UoSao Paulo staff made this workshop a great success. This workshop was developed through a collaboration with Drs. Vivian Pellizari and Rosana Vazoller at the University of São Paulo, and greatly supported by the visiting researcher Dr. Jorge Rodrigues from Michigan State University. After the workshop student questions are now answered in several follow-up sessions using the internet's instant messaging service WebCT. For more details, read the following news release from UMass.

June 2003 New publication from Klaus Nüsslein Read about the most recent results of Klaus Nüsslein's collaboration with the Department of Polymer Sciences and Engineering at UMass, in the June 2003 issue of Langmuir, the American Chemical Society Journal of Surfaces and Colloids. Specific recognition of bacteria by surface-templated polymer films. Das K., J. Penelle, V.A. Rotello, K. Nüsslein. 2003. LANGMUIR 19 (15): 6226-6229. Abstract Real-time selective recognition of cells is an important capability for medicine, molecular biology, and environmental science. We report here a cell-selective polymer film, obtained via polymerization of a thin film of functionalized monomers, in contact with a target cell. Under controlled conditions, the replica maintains exceptional structural memory of both shape and surface functionality of the initial bacterial cell. High selectivity is observed between bacteria featuring different cell surfaces (Gram-positive vs negative), shapes (rods vs spheres), and cell arrangements (single cells vs short chains vs clusters). Interfacing to a quartz crystal microbalance provides real-time, selective detection of bacteria at environmentally relevant concentrations of less than 500 cells/mL, an improvement of 100-fold in response time and 1,000,000-fold in sensitivity over current methods. This research was partially supported by a National Science Foundation grant to Klaus Nüsslein from the Life in Extreme Environments Program (DEB-0085495).

	Figure 1. Schematic representation of the surface-template directed process. A layer of monomers 1 and 2 is initially spun coat onto the surface, followed by cells. The monomers are then polymerized and cells are removed by lysis.
	Figure 2. Observed frequency shifts obtained from templated surfaces with E. coli (2a), S. aureus (2b), and B. megaterium (2c) to templating and other cell types. Frequency shifts represent a shift from equilibrium with saline solution.

May 2003 The Nüsslein Lab at ASM's General Meeting 2003- Washington D.C. Klaus Nüsslein presented "The Role of Rhizosphere Microbial Communities in Phytoremediation" as part of the symposium Plant-Rhizosphere Interactions: Applications to Phytoremediation, at the 103rd General Meeting of the American Society for Microbiology, in Washington D.C. Additionally, eight lab members presented posters between May 19 and May 22, 2003 with the latest research developments in the Nüsslein Lab. Below you may read the titles of the posters presented.

	097/Q K. Nüsslein "The role of rhizosphere microbial communities in phytoremediation" Symposium: "Plant-Rhizosphere Interactions: Applications to Phytoremediation"
	N-41 J.A. Izquierdo, A.J. Sandel, K. Nüsslein "Diazotrophic diversity in soil microenvironments from three different latitudes"
	N-341 C.C. Barreto, K.L. Forloney, K. Nüsslein "Identification of a heavy metal resistance gene in acidophilic bacteria"
	N-352 V. Gómez-Alvarez, G.M. King, K. Nüsslein "Microbial composition and the role of atmospheric trace gases on recent lava flows"
Not pictured:	N-167 B.P. Gibney, K. Nüsslein "Biogeochemical controls of arsenic release in the subsurface"
	N-267 D.M. Ciulla, K. Nüsslein "The potential role of Festuca arundinaceae (Tall fescue) in enriching for PCB-degrading bacteria"
	N-276 L.M Stout, M. Rothfeder, K. Nüsslein "Metal resistance characterization in the rhizosphere of the aquatic plant Lemna minor"

November 2002 The Nüsslein Lab on the News Two articles about the Davis Mine Project have been recently released. Make sure you read more about the perspectives on this project in Science Blog and Innovations Report.

May 2002 The Nüsslein Lab at ASM's General Meeting 2002- Salt Lake City, UT Six lab members presented posters at the 102nd General Meeting of the American Society for Microbiology, in Salt Lake City, UT between May 20 and May 23, 2002. Below you may read the titles of the presented posters.

	N-18 J.A. Izquierdo, K.R. Nüsslein "The water-stable microaggregate as a unique soil community microenvironment"
	N-51 L.M. Stout, K.R. Nüsslein "Rhizosphere bacterial involvement in phytoremediation of heavy metals"
	R-42 C.C. Barreto, K.L. Forloney, K.R. Nüsslein "Differences and similarities among plasmids isolated from acidophilic bacteria"
	N-132 B.P. Gibney, K.R. Nüsslein "Biogeochemical controls of arsenic release in the subsurface"
	N-140 V. Gómez-Alvarez, K.R. Nüsslein "Microbial diversity on volcanoes: the role of atmospheric trace gases in microbial colonization and succession on recent lava flow"