Hydrogen metabolism and energy costs of nitrogen fixation

Abstract

The high energy costs of biological nitrogen fixation are partly caused by hydrogen production during the reduction of dinitrogen to ammonia. Some nitrogen-fixing organisms can recycle the evolved hydrogen via a membrane-bound uptake hydrogenase. The energetic aspects of hydrogen metabolism and nitrogen fixation are discussed. Studies on both isolated nitrogenase proteins and nitrogen-fixing chemostat cultures show that energy limitation will result in a high hydrogen production by nitrogenase. In plant- Rhizobium symbiosis, the supply of oxygen or photosynthetate is the limiting factor for nitrogen fixation. In both cases, nitrogen fixation is energy-limited, and it is concluded that a large amount of hydrogen is produced during nitrogen fixation in these symbioses. Hydrogen reoxidation yields less energy than the oxidation of endogenous substrates, and therefore expression of hydrogenase under oxygen-limited conditions is energetically unfavourable. Moreover, hydrogen reoxidation can never completely regain the energy invested during hydrogen production. The controversial reports of the effect of hydrogen reoxidation on the efficiency of nitrogen fixation are being discussed. The determination of the energy costs of nitrogen fixation (expressed as the amount of ATP needed to fix 1 mol of N 2) using chemostat cultures is described. Calculations show that the nitrogenase-catalysed hydrogen production has more influence on the efficiency of nitrogen fixation than the absence or presence of a hydrogen uptake system.