BEAMM team

Biodiversity, Ecology and Adaptation

of Magnetotactic Microorganisms

Team objectives

Our team is interested in the biodiversity, ecology and adaptation of microorganisms to environmental constraints in aquatic environments with high physicochemical pressure.
Transmission electron microscopy images of environmental magnetotactic bacteria. Scale bars represent 0.5 µm

We are conducting a diversity exploration mission to:

  • Reveal new biological innovations and ecological strategies involved in the functioning and evolution of life
  • To propose high value-added microbial models in the field of biotechnology
One of the natural laboratories studied at the BEAM, the Lake Pavin, Auvergne

We are also interested in the underlying mechanisms to:

  • Determine the genetic, molecular and physiological basis for the detection and sequestration of physiologically important or toxic chemicals,
  • Elucidating the functional and evolutionary basis of highly specialised prokaryotic organelles, and
  • Understanding the responses of microorganisms to environmental fluctuations and their impacts on biogeochemical cycles from the life cycle scale of the organism to the geological time scale.
Transmission electron microscopy image and associated elemental maps of Fe and Ca of magnetotactic bacteria from Lake Pavin producing intracellular calcium carbonate

Interdisciplinarity

These missions are carried out by several individual projects within a circular and integrative scientific approach at the team level, in which we address issues and systems at different scales of time and biological complexity; i.e. from the nanoscale to ecosystems, and from the molecular to communities. Our work is based on a network of interactions between global approaches exploiting the latest generation of high-throughput data and mechanistic and multidisciplinary approaches involving aquatic sampling, culture, microbial physiology, biochemistry, molecular biology and various approaches to microscopy, spectroscopy and molecular phylogeny.

Transmission electron microscopy image of the colorised magnetosome chains of a magnetotactic cocci



Ongoing fundings

Ø  2024-2025 : Programme de recherche à risque CEA, action d’amorçage (Coordination C. Monteil). Collaboration with E. Pelletier (Genoscope, Evry) and K. Benzerara (IMPMC, Paris).

Exploration de la biodiversité et culture des microorganismes photosynthétiques pour les biocarburants de demain

 

Ø  2024-2025 : Appel à projet interdiscilinaire IM2B. P. Ortet in collaboration with C. Jourlin-Castelli (BIP, Marseille).

Décryptage du réseau de régulation impliquant le régulateur central du chimiotactisme et des acteurs de la synthèse et de la détection du di-GMPc par une combinaison d’approches in silico, in vitro et in vivo

 

Ø  2024-2026: ANR PRC MTB-CPR (Coordination C. Lefevre). Collaboration with R. Méheust (Genoscope, Evry).

Deciphering the ecology and functioning of the symbiotic relationships between nanobacteria (CPR) and magnetotactic bacteria

 

Ø  2022-2025: ANR PRC SymbioMagnet (Coordination C. Lefevre). Collaboration with N. Menguy (IMPMC, Paris) and D. Vallenet (Genoscope, Evry).

Deciphering the biodiversity, ecology and evolution of magnetotactic symbiosis

 

Ø  2022-2025: ANR PRC CarboMagnet (Coordination C. Monteil). Collaboration with K. Benzerara (IMPMC, Paris), D. Vallenet (Genoscope, Evry) and D. Jézéquel (IPGP, Paris).

Contribution of magnetotactic bacteria forming intracellular carbonate mineral phases to the sequestration of inorganic carbon and alkaline earth elements

 

Ø  2021-2024: ANR PRCi franco-allemande ANCESMAG (Partner C. Lefevre). Collaboration with D. Schüler (Bayreuth University) and G. Perrière (LBBE, Lyon).

Ancestral sequence reconstruction and functional expression of proteins involved in bacterial magnetosome biogenesis.

 

Team manager

Christopher LEFEVRE

Contact us

Key words

Microbiology, microscopy, ecology, biodiversity, evolution, biomineralization, magnetotaxis, chemotaxis, two-component systems (TCS), symbiotic interactions, molecular biology, genomics, data mining, artificial intelligence (AI).