ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2014
Ammonia-oxidizing archaea use the most energy-efficient aerobic pathway for CO2 fixation.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 203 papers.
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203 citing papers in PubMed, 498 citations in OpenAlex.
- Asynchronous recovery of canonical ammonia oxidizers and comammox drives post-drought NWorld journal of microbiology & biotechnology · 2026Article
- Branched-chain amino acid assimilation enables mixotrophy of ammonia-oxidizing archaeal sponge symbionts.Science advances · 2026Article
- Oxygen production as an electron overflow pathway in ammonia-oxidizing archaea.Science advances · 2026Article
- Seasonality of lake microbial denitrification and its sensitivity to climate warming.Nature microbiology · 2026Article
- In Vivo Enzyme Catalytic Rates in Formate-Growing Methanococcus maripaludis.Microbial biotechnology · 2026Article
- An Oxygen-Tolerant Archaeal Dehydratase Enables a Synthetic Pathway for 4-Hydroxybutyrate-Containing Polyesters from Glucose and COACS synthetic biology · 2026Article
- Crystal structure of 3-hydroxypropionyl-CoA synthetase (ADP-forming) fromCurrent research in structural biology · 2026Article
- Ammonia oxidation and recalcitrant carbon degradation fuel mixotrophic growth in the symbiont community of a deep-sea sponge.Microbiome · 2026Article
- Ghost-rocks' microbiota: metagenomic insights into their influence on the biogeochemistry of karstic cave and groundwater.FEMS microbiology ecology · 2026Article
- Ammonia monooxygenase: a work in progress.Chemical science · 2026Review
- Impact of microbial consortia and fertilization regimes on the soil microbiome in maize field trials.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Ocean warming enhances iron use efficiencies of marine ammonia-oxidizing archaea.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- EngineeringSynthetic and systems biotechnology · 2026Article
- A novel North Sea ammonia-oxidizing archaeon Nitrosarchaeum marinum leverages a high abundance of transport systems to grow over a wide salinity range.FEMS microbiology ecology · 2026Article
- From currents to water masses: fine-scale insights into microbial biogeography in the Kuroshio-Oyashio Extension region.Applied and environmental microbiology · 2026Article
- Disturbance reshapes functional redundancy and accelerates nitrification in soil nitrifying communities.The ISME journal · 2026Article
- Metabolic potential and contributions of ammonia-oxidizing microorganisms and complete ammonia oxidizers to soil nitrification in upland soils of northern China.ISME communications · 2026Article
- Article
- The hidden potential of archaea in carbon and nitrogen cycling in agricultural soils: a review.Frontiers in microbiology · 2026Review
- Obligate heterotrophy of hyperthermophilic archaeamicroLife · 2026Article
143 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
10 authors at 5 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Archaea of the phylum Thaumarchaeota are among the most abundant prokaryotes on Earth and are widely distributed in marine, terrestrial, and geothermal environments. All studied Thaumarchaeota couple the oxidation of ammonia at extremely low concentrations with carbon fixation. As the predominant nitrifiers in the ocean and in various soils, ammonia-oxidizing archaea contribute significantly to the global nitrogen and carbon cycles. Here we provide biochemical evidence that thaumarchaeal ammonia oxidizers assimilate inorganic carbon via a modified version of the autotrophic hydroxypropionate/hydroxybutyrate cycle of Crenarchaeota that is far more energy efficient than any other aerobic autotrophic pathway. The identified genes of this cycle were found in the genomes of all sequenced representatives of the phylum Thaumarchaeota, indicating the environmental significance of this efficient CO2-fixation pathway. Comparative phylogenetic analysis of proteins of this pathway suggests that the hydroxypropionate/hydroxybutyrate cycle emerged independently in Crenarchaeota and Thaumarchaeota, thus supporting the hypothesis of an early evolutionary separation of both archaeal phyla. We conclude that high efficiency of anabolism exemplified by this autotrophic cycle perfectly suits the lifestyle of ammonia-oxidizing archaea, which thrive at a constantly low energy supply, thus offering a biochemical explanation for their ecological success in nutrient-limited environments.
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