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Paloma Garrido Amador

Microbial Physiology Research Group

MPI for Marine Microbiology
Celsiusstr. 1
D-28359 Bremen
Germany

Room: 

3137

Phone: 

+49 421 2028-6530

Paloma Garrido Amador

Nitric oxide (NO) is a free radical gas with important functions in cell biology and atmospheric chemistry. Due to its high reactivity and its interactions with other radicals, NO is a very potent toxin that can inhibit microbial growth. For this reason, many bacteria detoxify NO employing an array of proteins to either reduce it or oxidize it to less reactive compounds. In some groups of bacteria, NO is utilized as a signaling molecule, regulating processes such as biofilm formation and dispersal, motility and quorum sensing. NO is also a key intermediate of various microbial nitrogen turnover processes, including denitrification, aerobic ammonia and anaerobic ammonium oxidation, and even nitrite-dependent anaerobic methane oxidation by methanotrophic bacteria. Since NO is present in cells at very low concentrations, transformed very rapidly, and toxic, its direct use for microbial respiration has been largely overlooked.

My research fo­cuses on microorganisms that can obtain energy from NO transformations. Us­ing con­tinu­ous and fed-batch biore­act­ors and samples from natural and engineered environments, my ob­ject­ive is to dis­cover and de­scribe en­ergy-con­serving bio­chem­ical re­ac­tions involving NO, as well as the mi­croor­gan­isms and the en­zymes in­volved.

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