Although Methanosarcinales are versatile concerning their methanogenic substrates, the ability of Methanosarcina thermophila to use carbon dioxide (CO₂) for catabolic and anabolic metabolism was not proven until now. Here, we show that M. thermophila used CO₂ to perform hydrogenotrophic methanogenesis in the presence as well as in the absence of methanol. During incubation with hydrogen, the methanogen utilized the substrates methanol and CO₂ consecutively, resulting in a biphasic methane production. Growth exclusively from CO₂ occurred slowly but reproducibly with concomitant production of biomass, verified by DNA quantification. Besides verification through multiple transfers into fresh medium, the identity of the culture was confirmed by 16s RNA sequencing, and the incorporation of carbon atoms from ¹³CO₂ into ¹³CH₄ molecules was measured to validate the obtained data. New insights into the physiology of M. thermophila can serve as reference for genomic analyses to link genes with metabolic features in uncultured organisms.

中文翻译：

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嗜热甲烷八叠球菌的氢营养产甲烷作用和自养生长。


尽管甲烷八叠球菌目的产甲烷底物具有多种用途，但嗜热甲烷八叠球菌利用二氧化碳 (CO ₂ ) 进行分解代谢和合成代谢的能力迄今为止尚未得到证实。在这里，我们表明嗜热毁丝霉在存在和不存在甲醇的情况下都使用CO ₂进行氢营养产甲烷作用。在与氢气一起孵育的过程中，产甲烷菌连续利用底物甲醇和CO ₂ ，​​从而产生双相甲烷。完全由CO ₂产生的生长缓慢但可重复地伴随着生物质的产生，经DNA定量验证。除了通过多次转移到新鲜培养基中进行验证之外，还通过16s RNA测序确认培养物的身份，并测量¹³ CO ₂碳原子与¹³ CH ₄分子的结合以验证所获得的数据。对嗜热毁丝霉生理学的新见解可以作为基因组分析的参考，将基因与未培养生物体的代谢特征联系起来。