ArticleThe ISME journal2021
Mercury methylation by metabolically versatile and cosmopolitan marine bacteria.
Article in The ISME journal, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 48 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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
48 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Re-thinking the link between exposure to mercury and blood pressure.Archives of toxicology · 2025Pooled it
- Prenatal Mercury Exposure and Neurodevelopment up to the Age of 5 Years: A Systematic Review.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Pooled it
- Denitrification Modularity and Its Environmental Controls in Transiently Versus Permanently Anoxic Marine Systems.Environmental microbiology · 2026Article
- Nutrient-Driven Modulation of Microbial, Plant, and Rhizosphere Processes for Heavy Metal Remediation.Plants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Metagenomics reveals diverse community of putative mercury methylators across different biogeochemical niches in Sansha Yongle blue hole.Marine life science & technology · 2026Article
- Mercury mobilization and export from the Greenland Ice Sheet using an ice-to-ocean approach.Communications earth & environment · 2026Article
- AMicrobial genomics · 2026Article
- MagnetotacticISME communications · 2026Article
- Genomic potential for mercury biotransformation in marine sediments across marginal slope to hadal zone.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Unveiling Hidden Mercury and Methylmercury Sources: The Role of Submarine Groundwater Discharge in Coastal Lagoons.Environmental science & technology · 2025Article
- Aligning global mercury mitigation with climate action.Nature communications · 2025Review
- Comprehensive heavy metal remediation mechanisms with insights into CRISPR-Cas9 and biochar innovations.Biodegradation · 2025Review
- Sulfate Reduction Drives Elevated Methylmercury Formation in the Water Column of a Eutrophic Freshwater Lake.Environmental science & technology · 2025Article
- Cold seeps are potential hotspots of deep-sea nitrogen loss driven by microorganisms across 21 phyla.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Distribution and function of prokaryotes involved in mercury methylation, demethylation, and reduction in the western North Pacific Subtropical Gyre.Frontiers in microbiology · 2025Article
- Overview of Methylation and Demethylation Mechanisms and Influencing Factors of Mercury in Water.Toxics · 2024Review
- Microorganisms Involved in Methylmercury Demethylation and Mercury Reduction are Widely Distributed and Active in the Bathypelagic Deep Ocean Waters.Environmental science & technology · 2024Article
- Functional Genes and Transcripts Indicate the Existent and Active Microbial Mercury-Methylating Community in Mangrove Intertidal Sediments of an Urbanized Bay.Microorganisms · 2024Article
- Intestinal microbiota protects against methylmercury-induced neurotoxicity.Biometals : an international journal on the role of metal ions in biology, biochemistry, and medicine · 2024Review
- Novel Alphaproteobacteria transcribe genes for nitric oxide transformation at high levels in a marine oxygen-deficient zone.Applied and environmental microbiology · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Microbes transform aqueous mercury (Hg) into methylmercury (MeHg), a potent neurotoxin that accumulates in terrestrial and marine food webs, with potential impacts on human health. This process requires the gene pair hgcAB, which encodes for proteins that actuate Hg methylation, and has been well described for anoxic environments. However, recent studies report potential MeHg formation in suboxic seawater, although the microorganisms involved remain poorly understood. In this study, we conducted large-scale multi-omic analyses to search for putative microbial Hg methylators along defined redox gradients in Saanich Inlet, British Columbia, a model natural ecosystem with previously measured Hg and MeHg concentration profiles. Analysis of gene expression profiles along the redoxcline identified several putative Hg methylating microbial groups, including Calditrichaeota, SAR324 and Marinimicrobia, with the last the most active based on hgc transcription levels. Marinimicrobia hgc genes were identified from multiple publicly available marine metagenomes, consistent with a potential key role in marine Hg methylation. Computational homology modelling predicts that Marinimicrobia HgcAB proteins contain the highly conserved amino acid sites and folding structures required for functional Hg methylation. Furthermore, a number of terminal oxidases from aerobic respiratory chains were associated with several putative novel Hg methylators. Our findings thus reveal potential novel marine Hg-methylating microorganisms with a greater oxygen tolerance and broader habitat range than previously recognized.
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.