Fe (III) reduction strategies of dissimilatory iron reducing bacteria

Abstract

Advances in applied and industrial microbial biotechnology have opened up many new avenues for application of several microorganisms. A group of certain metal reducers such as the dissimilatory iron reducing microorganisms possess an inherent potential to reduce oxidized metals under strict anaerobic/facultative anaerobic condition, thereby opening possibilities to combat environmental pollution. This unique property has invited researchers towards understanding the metabolic regulatory pathways that enables the microbes to thrive under extreme environmental conditions. Currently, dissimilatory iron reducing bacteria (DIRB) is in the focus of researchers to elucidate the specific mechanisms responsible for microbial metal reduction. The recent advances towards understanding the metabolism of iron reduction in Shewanella and Geobacter, the model DIRB has been covered in this review. It is believed that the metabolic insights into the Fe (III) reduction systems of the model DIRB; Shewanella and Geobacter (as discussed in the review) can be a basis for metabolic engineering to provide improved practical applications. With the advancement of our existing knowledge on the metabolic processes of the model iron reducers, applications ranging from laboratory to field scale practices can be carried out. DIRB has gained immense interest for its application in the field of bioremediation, electrobiosynthesis, and bioelectronics in this decade. It can therefore be anticipated that the forthcoming years will see more applications of microbial iron reducers based on the existing as well as advanced metabolic informations available in open source literature.