• Home
  • H. T. S. Boschker
H. T. S. Boschker

H. T. S. Boschker

Dr.

About

132
Publications
31,909
Reads
How we measure 'reads'
A 'read' is counted each time someone views a publication summary (such as the title, abstract, and list of authors), clicks on a figure, or views or downloads the full-text. Learn more
9,928
Citations

Publications

Publications (132)
Article
Full-text available
Cable bacteria embed a network of conductive protein fibers in their cell envelope that efficiently guides electron transport over distances spanning up to several centimeters. This form of long-distance electron transport is unique in biology and is mediated by a metalloprotein with a sulfur-coordinated nickel (Ni) cofactor. However, the molecular...
Article
Full-text available
Filamentous cable bacteria display long-range electron transport, generating electrical currents over centimeter distances through a highly ordered network of fibers embedded in their cell envelope. The conductivity of these periplasmic wires is exceptionally high for a biological material, but their chemical structure and underlying electron trans...
Article
Full-text available
Cable bacteria are multicellular, Gram-negative filamentous bacteria that display a unique division of metabolic labor between cells. Cells in deeper sediment layers are oxidizing sulfide, while cells in the surface layers of the sediment are reducing oxygen. The electrical coupling of these two redox half reactions is ensured via long-distance ele...
Preprint
Full-text available
Cable bacteria are electroactive bacteria that form a long, linear chain of ridged cylindrical cells. These filamentous bacteria perform centimeter-scale long-range electron transport through parallel, interconnected conductive pathways of which the detailed chemical and electrical properties are still unclear. Here, we combine ToF-SIMS (time of fl...
Preprint
Full-text available
Filamentous cable bacteria display unrivalled long-range electron transport, generating electrical currents over centimeter distances through a highly ordered network of fibers embedded in their cell envelope. The conductivity of these periplasmic wires is exceptionally high for a biological material, but their chemical structure and underlying ele...
Article
Full-text available
Microphytobenthos forms an important part of the diet of macrofauna (macrozoobenthos) in many intertidal ecosystems. It is unclear, however, whether the dependence of macrofauna on microphytobenthos varies spatially within and among tidal systems. We aim (1) to assess the spatial variability in the importance of microphytobenthos in the diet of mac...
Article
Full-text available
Significance Cable bacteria form centimeter-long, multicellular filaments whose energy metabolism involves cooperation among cells that separately perform oxidation of the electron donor and reduction of the electron acceptor. This cooperative division of labor is facilitated via long-range electrical currents that run from cell to cell along a net...
Article
Full-text available
Dark carbon fixation (DCF) by chemoautotrophic microorganisms can sustain food webs in the seafloor by local production of organic matter independent of photosynthesis. The process has received considerable attention in deep sea systems, such as hydrothermal vents, but the regulation, depth distribution, and global importance of coastal sedimentary...
Article
Full-text available
Biological electron transport is classically thought to occur over nanometre distances, yet recent studies suggest that electrical currents can run along centimetre-long cable bacteria. The phenomenon remains elusive, however, as currents have not been directly measured, nor have the conductive structures been identified. Here we demonstrate that c...
Article
Full-text available
Cable bacteria are long, multicellular micro-organisms that are capable of transporting electrons from cell to cell along the longitudinal axis of their centimeter-long filaments. The conductive structures that mediate this long-distance electron transport are thought to be located in the cell envelope. Therefore, this study examines in detail the...
Article
Coastal seas like the North Sea have been subject to major changes in nutrient inputs over the last decades, resulting in shifts of limiting nutrients for phytoplankton communities. Here we investigated the seasonal and spatial distribution and synthesis patterns of individual amino acids and distinct fatty acid groups and show how these were affec...
Article
Anoxic mineralization of organic matter releases dissolved inorganic carbon and produces reduced mineralization products. The reoxidation of these reduced compounds is essential for biogeochemical cycling in sediments and is mainly performed by chemoautotrophic microbes, which synthesize new organic carbon by dark CO2 fixation. At present however,...
Article
Significance Cable bacteria are centimeter-long, multicellular filamentous bacteria, which are globally occurring in marine and freshwater sediments. Their presence coincides with the occurrence of electrical fields, and gradients of oxygen and sulfide that are best explained by electron transport from sulfide to oxygen along the cable-bacteria fil...
Article
We investigated seasonal changes in the production of extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) and short-chain organic acids (SCOA) exuded by benthic diatoms, and the use of these exudates as a carbon source by heterotrophic bacteria. An in situ ¹³C pulse-chase method was used to follow the fate of EPS for 5 consecutive days. These experiments were...
Article
Full-text available
The flexible regulation of feeding behaviour and nutrient metabolism is a prerequisite for consumers to grow and survive under variable food conditions. Thus, it is essential to understand the ecological trade‐offs that restrict regulatory mechanisms in consumers to evaluate the consequences of nutrient limitations for trophic interactions. Here, w...
Article
Full-text available
Benthic diatoms are important primary producers in intertidal marine sediments and form the basis of the food web in these ecosystems. In order to investigate the carbon flow within diatom mats, we performed in situ 13C pulse-chase labeling experiments and followed in detail the biochemical fate of carbon fixed by the diatoms for five consecutive d...
Article
Full-text available
One of the major challenges in ecological stoichiometry is to establish how environmental changes in resource availability may affect both the biochemical composition of organisms and the species composition of communities. This is a pressing issue in many coastal waters, where anthropogenic activities have caused large changes in riverine nutrient...
Article
Full-text available
Seasonal hypoxia in coastal systems drastically changes the availability of electron acceptors in bottom water, which alters the sedimentary reoxidation of reduced compounds. However, the effect of seasonal hypoxia on the chemolithoautotrophic community that catalyzes these reoxidation reactions is rarely studied. Here, we examine the changes in ac...
Article
Full-text available
Recently, long filamentous bacteria have been reported conducting electrons over centimetre distances in marine sediments. These so-called cable bacteria perform an electrogenic form of sulfur oxidation, whereby long-distance electron transport links sulfide oxidation in deeper sediment horizons to oxygen reduction in the upper millimetres of the s...
Article
Full-text available
Agaricus bisporus mushrooms are commercially produced on a microbe rich compost. Here, fungal and bacterial biomass was quantified in compost with and without colonization by A. bisporus. Chitin content, indicative of total fungal biomass, increased during a 26-day period from 576 to 779 nmol N-acetylglucosamine g⁻¹ compost in the absence of A. bis...
Article
Full-text available
Anthropogenic activities resulted in major shifts in nutrient inputs to coastal seas, which may have altered the biomolecule composition of phytoplankton because of different C : N : P requirements for biosynthesis. In order to understand the effects of N- and P-limitation on the allocation of photosynthetically fixed C, we directly measured season...
Article
Full-text available
Recently, long filamentous bacteria have been reported to conduct electrons over centimetre distances in marine sediments. These so-called cable bacteria perform a novel "electrogenic" form of sulfur oxidation, whereby long-distance electron transport links sulfide oxidation in deeper sediment horizons to oxygen reduction in the upper millimetres o...
Article
Full-text available
Bioturbation has major impacts on sediment biogeochemistry, which can be linked to the functional traits of the macrofauna involved. Nereis (Hediste) diversicolor and Marenzelleria viridis are 2 functionally different bioturbating polychaetes that strongly affect the ecology and biogeochemistry of coastal sediments. However, the different effects o...
Article
Full-text available
Methane-derived carbon can be important in both benthic and pelagic food webs. Either generated in the anaerobic layers of the sediment or in the anaerobic hypolimnion of stratified eutrophic lakes, methane is an excellent carbon source for aerobic methanotrophic bacteria. The very negative methane δ13C-signal in the methanotrophic biomass provides...
Article
Full-text available
Measurement of total primary production using 13C incorporation is a widely established tool. However, these bulk measurements lack information about the fate of fixed carbon: the production of major cellular compounds (carbohydrates, amino acids, fatty acids, and DNA/RNA) is affected by for instance nutrient availability as their C:N:P requirement...
Article
RATIONALE: We compared gas chromatography/isotope ratio mass spectrometry (GC/IRMS) and liquid chromatography/isotope ratio mass spectrometry (LC/IRMS) for the measurement of δ13C values in carbohydrates. Contrary to GC/IRMS, no derivatisation is needed for LC/IRMS analysis of carbohydrates. Hence, although LC/IRMS is expected to be more accurate a...
Article
Full-text available
Recently, a novel electrogenic type of sulphur oxidation was documented in marine sediments, whereby filamentous cable bacteria (Desulfobulbaceae) are mediating electron transport over cm-scale distances. These cable bacteria are capable of developing an extensive network within days, implying a highly efficient carbon acquisition strategy. Present...
Article
Full-text available
Large filamentous sulfur-oxidizing bacteria belonging to the Beggiatoacae family can cover large portions of shallow marine sediments surrounding mangroves in Guadeloupe (French West Indies). In order to assess the importance of Beggiatoa mats as an infaunal food source, observations were conducted of the area within mats and at increasing distance...
Article
Full-text available
To get a better understanding of sponge feeding biology and efficiencies, the fatty acid (FA) composition and (13)C natural abundance of sponges and of suspended particulate matter (SPM) from surrounding seawater was studied in different seasons at three locations. Haliclona oculata and Haliclona xena from the Oosterschelde, the Netherlands, Halich...
Article
Full-text available
Soil fungal communities were studied in an actively developing coastal dune system at Goeree Island, the Netherlands. A shore to inland sampling transect was laid out, extending from coastal brackish marshes to recently formed foredunes to older dune pastures to adjacent woodlands. Soil samples from these biotopes were thoroughly characterized by a...
Article
Full-text available
Chemoautotrophy has been little studied in typical coastal marine sediments, but may be an important component of carbon recycling as intense anaerobic mineralization processes in these sediments lead to accumulation of high amounts of reduced compounds, such as sulfides and ammonium. We studied chemoautotrophy by measuring dark-fixation of 13C-bic...
Article
Carbon flow from benthic diatoms to heterotrophic bacterial was traced in an intertidal sediment for 5 consecutive days. 13C-labeled bicarbonate was sprayed onto the sediment surface during low tide and 13C-label incorporation in major carbon pools, intermediate metabolites, and biomarkers were monitored. Phospholipid-derived fatty acid (PLFA) and...
Article
RATIONALELiquid chromatography/isotope ratio mass spectrometry (LC/IRMS) is currently the most accurate and precise technique for the measurement of compound-specific stable carbon isotope ratios (13C/12C) in biological metabolites, at their natural abundance. However, until now this technique could not be applied for the analysis of nucleic acids,...
Article
Full-text available
Phospholipid-derived fatty acids (PLFA) and respiratory quinones (RQ) are microbial compounds that have been utilized as biomarkers to quantify bacterial biomass and to characterize microbial community structure in sediments, waters, and soils. While PLFAs have been widely used as quantitative bacterial biomarkers in marine sediments, applications...
Article
Full-text available
Recently, a novel mode of sulphur oxidation was described in marine sediments, in which sulphide oxidation in deeper anoxic layers was electrically coupled to oxygen reduction at the sediment surface. Subsequent experimental evidence identified that long filamentous bacteria belonging to the family Desulfobulbaceae likely mediated the electron tran...
Article
Full-text available
Haplognathia ruberrima is a cosmopolitan gnathostomulid species found in sulfur bacterial mats in mangroves in Guadeloupe (French West Indies). Haplo-gnathia ruberrima presents a d 13 C value lower than all measured meiofaunal grazers and lower than the available measured food sources of this environment. This low d 13 C value can not be due to spe...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Coastal waters have been affected by eutrophication and subsequent “restoring efforts”, which induced changes in riverine nutrient loads and altered the relative nutrient availability. As a consequence, changes in the limiting resource can alter the biochemical composition of phytoplankton and propagate through the food web, affecting its structure...
Article
The long-term retention of nitrogen in sediment of a tidal freshwater marsh in the Scheldt estuary (Belgium) was investigated by an in situ 15N-labeling experiment. Sediment of an unvegetated creek bank and sediment vegetated by common reed (Phragmites australis) were labeled with 15N-enriched NH z 4 after which 15N was traced into pore-water disso...
Article
Full-text available
A psychro- and aerotolerant bacterium was isolated from the sulfidic water of a pelagic redox zone of the central Baltic Sea. The slightly curved rod- or spiral-shaped cells are motile by one polar flagellum or two bipolar flagella. Growth is chemolithoautotrophic, with nitrate or nitrite as electron acceptor and either a variety of sulfur species...
Article
Full-text available
In this study, we examined the biomass and community structure of sediment bacteria from marine sediments using bacterial phospholipid-derived fatty acids (PLFA) analysis and respiratory quinone profiling method. We also examined relationship between organic carbon contents and concentrations of each biomarker in the sediments. Bacterial PLFAs and...
Article
Carbon (C) uptake by terrestrial ecosystems represents an important option for partially mitigating anthropogenic CO2 emissions. Short-term atmospheric elevated CO2 exposure has been shown to create major shifts in C flow routes and diversity of the active soil-borne microbial community. Long-term increases in CO2 have been hypothesized to have sub...
Article
Full-text available
We examined the responses of biota at or near the base of the benthic food web to nutrient enrichment in salt marsh mudflats in Plum Island estuary (Massachusetts, USA). To simulate eutrophication, nitrate and phosphate loading rates were increased 10- to 15-fold in creeks fertilized for 2 mo (i.e. short-term enrichment) or 6 yr (chronic enrichment...
Article
Full-text available
Stable isotope probing of magnetic-bead-captured rRNA (Mag-SIP) indicated clear differences in in situ organic substrate utilization by major microbial groups between the more oxidized (0 to 2 cm) and sulfate-reducing (2 to 5 cm) horizons of marine intertidal sediment. We also showed that cyanobacteria and diatoms may survive by glucose utilization...
Article
The coccolithophore Emiliania huxleyi plays a pivotal role in the marine carbon cycle. However, we have only limited understanding of how its life cycle and bacterial interactions affect the production and composition of dissolved extracellular organic carbon and its transfer to the particulate pool. We traced the fate of photosynthetically fixed c...
Article
• The aim of this study was to gain understanding of the carbon flow from the roots of a genetically modified (GM) amylopectin-accumulating potato (Solanum tuberosum) cultivar and its parental isoline to the soil fungal community using stable isotope probing (SIP). • The microbes receiving (13)C from the plant were assessed through RNA/phospholipid...
Article
1. The ability of exotic plant species to establish and expand in new areas may be enhanced by a relatively high ability to acquire soil nutrients. To test this hypothesis, we predicted that the capacity for nutrient acquisition would be higher in seedlings of exotic species than in seedlings of native congeners. 2. We selected the five exotic spec...
Article
The composition and production of carbohydrates (mannose, rhamnose, fucose, galactose, glucose, and xylose) and their transfer among sediment compartments (microphytobenthos [MPB], bacteria, and detritus) was investigated through in situ labeling with 13C-bicarbonate. After 60 h, 13C was found in all sediment compartments, demonstrating rapid trans...
Article
Significant amounts of glycerol reach the colon microbiota daily through the diet and/or by in situ microbial production or release from desquamated epithelial cells. Some gut microorganisms may anaerobically reduce glycerol to 1,3-propanediol (1,3-PDO), with 3-hydroxypropanal as an intermediate. Accumulation of the latter intermediate may result i...
Article
Rising atmospheric CO(2) levels are predicted to have major consequences on carbon cycling and the functioning of terrestrial ecosystems. Increased photosynthetic activity is expected, especially for C-3 plants, thereby influencing vegetation dynamics; however, little is known about the path of fixed carbon into soil-borne communities and resulting...
Article
The beaches of the North Sea barrier island Schiermonnikoog (The Netherlands) are covered by microbial mats. Five types of microbial mats were distinguished based on a variety of characteristics, located along a transect perpendicular to the coast. Biomass abundance and composition of the microbial community were analyzed in these mats using pigmen...
Article
The use of stable isotope labelled glucose provides insight into glucose metabolism. The 13C-isotopic enrichment of glucose is usually measured by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS) or gas chromatography/combustion/isotope ratio mass spectrometry (GC/C/IRMS). However, in both techniques the samples must be derivatized prior to analysis, w...
Article
Stable-isotope labeling of phospholipid-derived fatty acids (PLFAs) is a potentially powerful technique to study group-specific primary production of phytoplankton, as many algal groups possess a specific PLFA composition, and it is relatively simple to measure the isotopic composition of a large number of PLFAs. Experiments with cultured algae sho...
Article
Full-text available
We further developed the stable isotope probing, magnetic-bead capture method to make it applicable for linking microbial community function to phylogeny at the class and family levels. The main improvements were a substantial decrease in the protocol blank and an approximately 10-fold increase in the detection limit by using a micro-elemental anal...
Article
We have developed a method to analyze stable carbon isotope ((13)C/(12)C) ratios in a variety of carbohydrates using high-performance liquid chromatography/isotope ratio mass spectrometry (HPLC/IRMS). The chromatography is based on strong anion-exchange columns with low strength NaOH eluents. An eluent concentration of 1 mM resulted in low backgrou...
Article
1. The value of algal fatty acids (FA) as diet biomarkers for benthic harpacticoid copepods was investigated. A high proportion of 18:1ω9 and 18:2ω6 FA was observed in the lipid reserve fraction of copepods fed with cyanobacteria. In contrast, a high proportion of 16:1ω7 and ω3 FA (including eicosapentaenoic) was present in the lipid reserve fracti...
Article
The increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) levels is predicted to stimulate plant carbon (C) fixation, potentially influencing the size, structure and function of micro- and mesofaunal communities inhabiting the rhizosphere. To assess the effects of increased atmospheric CO2 on bacterial, fungal and nematode communities in the rhizosphere, Ca...
Article
Full-text available
After publication of the original manuscript, the presented method has been applied in various 15N- and 13C-labeling studies to trace incorporation of 15N- and/or 13C into bacterial and total microbial biomass in different coastal sediments (Veuger et al. 2006, Veuger 2006). These applications and analysis of the D-Ala content of some algal- and cy...
Chapter
Full-text available
Anthropogenic nutrient inputs to aquatic systems exceed those under pristine conditions. This has resulted in numerous changes in their functioning of which eutrophication effects, the development of nuisance algal blooms, seasonal anoxia, the disappearance of seagrasses are illustrative, well-documented examples (Heip, 1995; Duarte, 1995). Concern...
Article
The unusually harsh environmental conditions of terrestrial Antarctic habitats result in ecosystems with simplified trophic structures, where microbial processes are especially dominant as drivers of soil-borne nutrient cycling. We examined soil-borne Antarctic communities (bacteria, fungi and nematodes) at five locations along a southern latitudin...