Microbial Genome Sequencing: Genome Sequences for Four Phototrophic Prokaryotes

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Complete genome sequencing will be done for four photosynthetic bacteria. Genome sequences of these organisms will fill large gaps in the available genomic data for photosynthetic organisms and will help to understand the origin and early evolution of photosynthesis. In addition, the data that will be obtained will have agricultural applications and environmental importance for understanding global photosynthetic productivity. Photosynthesis has a deep evolutionary connection to nitrogen fixation and many photosynthetic bacteria are capable of nitrogen fixation. Our ability to understand these complex evolutionary relationships and metabolic processes is limited by a lack of data. This genome project will fill major gaps in the evolutionary picture of photosynthesis and its relation to other biological processes. The organisms that will be sequenced in this project are Heliobacterium modesticaldum, Roseobacter denitrificans, Rhodocista centenaria and Acaryochloris marina. The project will actively engage a large number of bioinformatics students in the annotation efforts. Bioinformatics graduate students will use the raw genome data as part of "real world" class exercises to identify metabolic pathways or families of transport proteins. The project team includes experts on each organism, including Robert Blankenship, Michael Madigan, Thomas Beatty, Carl Bauer, Mamoro Mimuro and Hideaki Miyashita and a highly experienced sequencing center, directed by Jeffrey Touchman. The team will also partner with the public science museum at the Arizona Science Center to develop public displays and teacher training materials aimed at communicating the excitement and benefits of microbial genomics to the general public and to school children, respectively.