Molecular Biogeochemistry of Modern and Ancient Marine Microbes

Jacob R. Waldbauer, Ph.D., 2010
Sallie Chisholm and Roger Summons, Advisors

Biological activity has shaped the surface of the earth in numerous ways, but life’s most pervasive and persistent global impact has been the secular oxidation of the surface environment.  This thesis addresses aspects of the role of marine microorganisms in driving this process.  Biomarkers (hydrocarbon molecular fossils) from the Transvaal Supergroup, South Africa, document the presence in the oceans of a diverse microbiota, including eukaryotes, as well as oxygenic photosynthesis and aerobic biochemistry, by ca. 2.7Ga.  Experimental study of the oxygen requirements of steroid biosynthesis suggests that sterane biomarkers in late Archean rocks are consistent with the persistence of microaerobic surface ocean environments long before the initial oxygenation of the atmosphere.  Using Prochlorococcus (a marine cyanobacterium that is the most abundant primary producer on earth today) as a model system, we explored how microbes use the limited nutrient resources available in the marine environment to make the protein catalysts that enable primary production.  Quantification of the Prochlorococcus proteome over the diel cell-division cycle reveals that protein abundances are distinct from transcript-level dynamics, and that small temporal shifts in enzyme levels can redirect metabolic fluxes.