Archaeal genes articles from across Nature Portfolio

A conjugative plasmid isolated from Thermococcus enables interspecies transfer across Archaea, whether naturally competent or not, and at temperatures up to 100 °C.

A heterologous protein expression platform in a culturable methanogen Methanococcus maripaludis is developed to study the methyl-coenzyme M reductase from uncultured archaea.

Metagenomes from 359 steers demonstrate a strong relationship between host genomics and microbial gene abundances, particularly those correlated with bovine emissions of methane.

Methane metabolism by some lineages of Archaea contributes to the cycling of carbon on Earth. Here, the authors show high diversity of methyl-coenzyme M reductase (Mcr), a key enzyme associated with archaeal methane/alkane metabolism, in hot spring Archaea, and investigate their ecological roles and evolution.

Certain archaea appear to metabolize fatty acids, but the regulation of these pathways is unclear. Here, Wang et al. provide genetic, functional and structural evidence supporting that a TetR-family transcriptional regulator is involved in regulation of fatty acid metabolism in Sulfolobus acidocaldarius.

Regulation of transcriptional termination in archaea has remained a mystery. Now, a high-throughput RNA sequencing approach identifies multiple archaeal genes that contain consecutive terminators, suggesting new ways by which these microorganisms regulate transcription.