ReviewFEMS microbiology reviews2020
Physiological limits to life in anoxic subseafloor sediment.
Review in FEMS microbiology reviews, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 22 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
22 citing papers in PubMed.
- Depth-associated selection and drift shape persistent microbial populations in Holocene lake sediments.mSystems · 2026Article
- The Deep Subsurface Biosphere and its Substrates Along a One-Million-Year Ferruginous Lake Archive.Microbial ecology · 2025Article
- Persistent functional and taxonomic groups dominate an 8,000-year sedimentary sequence from Lake Cadagno, Switzerland.Frontiers in microbiology · 2025Article
- Lipid biomarkers reveal dominance of aerobic methanotrophy in a continental serpentinizing system.Frontiers in microbiology · 2025Article
- Vertically stratified carbon fixation and coupling processes in deep-sea sediment.ISME communications · 2025Article
- Geochemical variability and microbial metabolic functions in oligotrophic sediments exposed to minor seepage.Frontiers in microbiology · 2025Review
- Amino acids could sustain fungal life in the energy-limited anaerobic sediments below the seafloor.Applied and environmental microbiology · 2024Article
- A unique subseafloor microbiosphere in the Mariana Trench driven by episodic sedimentation.Marine life science & technology · 2024Article
- Comparative single-cell genomics of Atribacterota JS1 in the Japan Trench hadal sedimentary biosphere.mSphere · 2024Article
- Metabolic features that select for Bathyarchaeia in modern ferruginous lacustrine subsurface sediments.ISME communications · 2024Article
- Taxonomic Re-Classification and Expansion of the Phylum Chloroflexota Based on over 5000 Genomes and Metagenome-Assembled Genomes.Microorganisms · 2023Article
- Cell-specific rates of sulfate reduction and fermentation in the sub-seafloor biosphere.Frontiers in microbiology · 2023Article
- Hyperthermophilic endospores germinate and metabolize organic carbon in sediments heated to 80°C.Environmental microbiology · 2022Article
- Reconsidering the in vivo functions of Clostridial Stickland amino acid fermentations.Anaerobe · 2022Review
- Catabolic protein degradation in marine sediments confined to distinct archaea.The ISME journal · 2022Article
- Article
- Metabolic energy conservation for fermentative product formation.Microbial biotechnology · 2021Review
- Pyrophosphate and Irreversibility in Evolution, or why PPFrontiers in microbiology · 2021Article
- Vertical Stratification of Dissolved Organic Matter Linked to Distinct Microbial Communities in Subtropic Estuarine Sediments.Frontiers in microbiology · 2021Article
- Exploring the abundance, metabolic potential and gene expression of subseafloor Chloroflexi in million-year-old oxic and anoxic abyssal clay.FEMS microbiology ecology · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
In subseafloor sediment, microbial cell densities exponentially decrease with depth into the fermentation zone. Here, we address the classical question of 'why are cells dying faster than they are growing?' from the standpoint of physiology. The stoichiometries of fermentative ATP production and consumption in the fermentation zone place bounds on the conversion of old cell biomass into new. Most fermentable organic matter in deep subseafloor sediment is amino acids from dead cells because cells are mostly protein by weight. Conversion of carbon from fermented dead cell protein into methanogen protein via hydrogenotrophic and acetoclastic methanogenesis occurs at ratios of ∼200:1 and 100:1, respectively, while fermenters can reach conversion ratios approaching 6:1. Amino acid fermentations become thermodynamically more efficient at lower substrate and product concentrations, but the conversion of carbon from dead cell protein into fermenter protein is low because of the high energetic cost of translation. Low carbon conversion factors within subseafloor anaerobic feeding chains account for exponential declines in cellular biomass in the fermentation zone of anoxic sediments. Our analysis points to the existence of a life-death transition zone in which the last biologically catalyzed life processes are replaced with purely chemical reactions no longer coupled to life.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.