Widespread extracellular electron transfer pathways for charging microbial cytochrome OmcS nanowires via periplasmic cytochromes PpcABCDE.

ABSTRACT: Extracellular electron transfer (EET) via microbial nanowires drives globally-important environmental processes and biotechnological applications for bioenergy, bioremediation, and bioelectronics. Due to highly-redundant and complex EET pathways, it is unclear how microbes wire electrons rapidly (>10⁶s^-1) from the inner-membrane through outer-surface nanowires directly to an external environment despite a crowded periplasm and slow (<10⁵s^-1) electron diffusion among periplasmic cytochromes. Here, we show that Geobacter sulfurreducens periplasmic cytochromes PpcABCDE inject electrons directly into OmcS nanowires by binding transiently with differing efficiencies, with the least-abundant cytochrome (PpcC) showing the highest efficiency. Remarkabl

SUBMITTER: Portela PC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10954620 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature