Journal
SCIENCE
Volume 336, Issue 6080, Pages 459-462Publisher
AMER ASSOC ADVANCEMENT SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1126/science.1216171
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Funding
- French Ministere de la Recherche et de l'Enseignement Superieur
- CNRS
- Institut National des Sciences de l'Univers (INSU)
- Region Ile de France [SESAME 2006 I-07-593/R]
- INSU-CNRS
- INP-CNRS
- University Pierre et Marie Curie, Paris
- NSF
- U.S. Environmental Protection Agency through the Center for Environmental Implications of Nanotechnology [EF-0830093]
- Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Division of Chemical Sciences, Geosciences, and Biosciences and Materials Sciences Division, U.S. Department of Energy, at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
- Office of Basic Energy Sciences of the U.S. Department of Energy [DE-AC02-05CH11231]
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Cyanobacteria have affected major geochemical cycles (carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen) on Earth for billions of years. In particular, they have played a major role in the formation of calcium carbonates (i.e., calcification), which has been considered to be an extracellular process. We identified a cyanobacterium in modern microbialites in Lake Alchichica (Mexico) that forms intracellular amorphous calcium-magnesium-strontium-barium carbonate inclusions about 270 nanometers in average diameter, revealing an unexplored pathway for calcification. Phylogenetic analyses place this cyanobacterium within the deeply divergent order Gloeobacterales. The chemical composition and structure of the intracellular precipitates suggest some level of cellular control on the biomineralization process. This discovery expands the diversity of organisms capable of forming amorphous calcium carbonates.
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