Heiden Stefan E.

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Heiden
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Stefan E.
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  • Article
    Genome sequence of the sulfur-oxidizing Bathymodiolus thermophilus gill endosymbiont
    (BioMed Central, 2017-09-02) Ponnudurai, Ruby ; Sayavedra, Lizbeth ; Kleiner, Manuel ; Heiden, Stefan E. ; Thürmer, Andrea ; Felbeck, Horst ; Schlüter, Rabea ; Sievert, Stefan M. ; Daniel, Rolf ; Schweder, Thomas ; Markert, Stephanie
    Bathymodiolus thermophilus, a mytilid mussel inhabiting the deep-sea hydrothermal vents of the East Pacific Rise, lives in symbiosis with chemosynthetic Gammaproteobacteria within its gills. The intracellular symbiont population synthesizes nutrients for the bivalve host using the reduced sulfur compounds emanating from the vents as energy source. As the symbiont is uncultured, comprehensive and detailed insights into its metabolism and its interactions with the host can only be obtained from culture-independent approaches such as genomics and proteomics. In this study, we report the first draft genome sequence of the sulfur-oxidizing symbiont of B. thermophilus, here tentatively named Candidatus Thioglobus thermophilus. The draft genome (3.1 Mb) harbors 3045 protein-coding genes. It revealed pathways for the use of sulfide and thiosulfate as energy sources and encodes the Calvin-Benson-Bassham cycle for CO2 fixation. Enzymes required for the synthesis of the tricarboxylic acid cycle intermediates oxaloacetate and succinate were absent, suggesting that these intermediates may be substituted by metabolites from external sources. We also detected a repertoire of genes associated with cell surface adhesion, bacteriotoxicity and phage immunity, which may perform symbiosis-specific roles in the B. thermophilus symbiosis.
  • Article
    Comparative proteomics of related symbiotic mussel species reveals high variability of host-symbiont interactions
    (Springer Nature, 2019-11-04) Ponnudurai, Ruby ; Heiden, Stefan E. ; Sayavedra, Lizbeth ; Hinzke, Tjorven ; Kleiner, Manuel ; Hentschker, Christian ; Felbeck, Horst ; Sievert, Stefan M. ; Schlüter, Rabea ; Becher, Dorte ; Schweder, Thomas ; Markert, Stephanie
    Deep-sea Bathymodiolus mussels and their chemoautotrophic symbionts are well-studied representatives of mutualistic host–microbe associations. However, how host–symbiont interactions vary on the molecular level between related host and symbiont species remains unclear. Therefore, we compared the host and symbiont metaproteomes of Pacific B. thermophilus, hosting a thiotrophic symbiont, and Atlantic B. azoricus, containing two symbionts, a thiotroph and a methanotroph. We identified common strategies of metabolic support between hosts and symbionts, such as the oxidation of sulfide by the host, which provides a thiosulfate reservoir for the thiotrophic symbionts, and a cycling mechanism that could supply the host with symbiont-derived amino acids. However, expression levels of these processes differed substantially between both symbioses. Backed up by genomic comparisons, our results furthermore revealed an exceptionally large repertoire of attachment-related proteins in the B. thermophilus symbiont. These findings imply that host–microbe interactions can be quite variable, even between closely related systems.