ArticleMolecular microbiology2020
Do reactive oxygen species or does oxygen itself confer obligate anaerobiosis? The case of Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron.
Article in Molecular microbiology, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 16 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
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
16 citing papers in PubMed, 24 citations in OpenAlex.
- Microbial engraftment and immune regulation during fecal microbiota transplantation and immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy.Nature communications · 2026Review
- An anaerobic pathogen rewires host metabolism to fuel oxidative growth in the inflamed gut.Cell · 2026Article
- Rational engineering of facultative anaerobiosis enables commensal survival in the oxygenated gut.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- The interplay of specialized metabolites, antibiotic resistance, and virulence in Enterococcus faecium: in silico analysis of bacterial genomes.BMC genomics · 2026Article
- Multifunctional thermosensitive hydrogel for synergistic antibacterial, anti-inflammatory and osteogenic effects to promote periodontal regeneration in periodontitis treatment.Regenerative biomaterials · 2026Article
- Commensal resilience: ancient ecological lessons for the modern microbiota.Infection and immunity · 2025Review
- Large-scale metagenomic assembly provide new insights into the genetic evolution of gut microbiomes in plateau ungulates.NPJ biofilms and microbiomes · 2024Article
- New functions of pirin proteins and a 2-ketoglutarate: Ferredoxin oxidoreductase ortholog in Bacteroides fragilis metabolism and their impact on antimicrobial susceptibility to metronidazole and amixicile.MicrobiologyOpen · 2024Article
- Discovery of a Biotin Synthase That Utilizes an Auxiliary 4Fe-5S Cluster for Sulfur Insertion.Journal of the American Chemical Society · 2024Article
- Roles of flavoprotein oxidase and the exogenous heme- and quinone-dependent respiratory chain in lactic acid bacteria.Bioscience of microbiota, food and health · 2024Review
- Article
- Investigation and Alteration of Organic Acid Synthesis Pathways in the Mammalian Gut Symbiont Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron.Microbiology spectrum · 2022Article
- When anaerobes encounter oxygen: mechanisms of oxygen toxicity, tolerance and defence.Nature reviews. Microbiology · 2021Review
- How Microbes Evolved to Tolerate Oxygen.Trends in microbiology · 2021Review
- GAL08, an Uncultivated Group ofFrontiers in microbiology · 2021Article
- Effect of Oxygen Contamination on Propionate and Caproate Formation in Anaerobic Fermentation.Frontiers in bioengineering and biotechnology · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron was examined to determine whether its obligate anaerobiosis is imposed by endogenous reactive oxygen species or by molecular oxygen itself. Previous analyses established that aerated B. thetaiotaomicron loses some enzyme activities due to a high rate of endogenous superoxide formation. However, the present study establishes that another key step in central metabolism is poisoned by molecular oxygen itself. Pyruvate dissimilation was shown to depend upon two enzymes, pyruvate:formate lyase (PFL) and pyruvate:ferredoxin oxidoreductase (PFOR), that lose activity upon aeration. PFL is a glycyl-radical enzyme whose vulnerability to oxygen is already understood. The rate of PFOR damage was unaffected by the level of superoxide or peroxide, showing that molecular oxygen itself is the culprit. The cell cannot repair PFOR, which amplifies the impact of damage. The rates of PFOR and fumarase inactivation are similar, suggesting that superoxide dismutase is calibrated so the oxygen- and superoxide-sensitive enzymes are equally sensitive to aeration. The physiological purpose of PFL and PFOR is to degrade pyruvate without disrupting the redox balance, and they do so using catalytic mechanisms that are intrinsically vulnerable to oxygen. In this way, the anaerobic excellence and oxygen sensitivity of B. thetaiotaomicron are two sides of the same coin.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
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.