Revealing Cryptic Carbon Metabolic Pathways in Two UAE Native Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon Degrading Microbe Isolates

Abstract

There are gaps in the knowledge of bacterial metabolic pathways and enzymes that degrade polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH). Closing these gaps will allow for the selection and bioengineering of PAH degrading bacteria to enhance their abilities in degrading PAHs. We manually reconstructed and curated a PAH degrading pathway library for two UAE-native Achromobacter genomes by identifying the enzymes responsible for degradation of PAHs and other aromatic hydrocarbons. A comparative genomic analysis was performed using PATRIC (Pathosystems Resource Integration Center) to compare the genomes of the two UAE-native Achromobacter isolates to the closest relative public genomes. The results of this study were used to construct theoretical metabolic pathway libraries. 27 PAH degrading enzymes were found in C2 strain and 26 in KW38 strain. These enzymes were aligned to the reference genomes and to other public genomes available in NCBI bank. Then the sequences were curated before threading their protein structures. Finally, the predicted carbon utilization metabolic pathways were validated using RT-qPCR experiment.

Date of Award	Dec 2022
Original language	American English
Supervisor	Anna-Maria Pappa (Supervisor)