Chemical signatures of magnetite produced by iron-metabolizing bacteria

• Applicants: Professor Dr. Andreas Kappler; Professor Dr. Ronny Schönberg, Ph.D.
• Subject Area: Mineralogy, Petrology and Geochemistry
• Term: from 2016 to 2019
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 287174037

• Final Report Year: 2021

Final Report Abstract

In summary, we have used this project to investigate several important issues relevant to the interactions between iron-metabolizing bacteria and iron minerals. Through this work, we were able to show that (1) green rust can be oxidized by Fe(II)-oxidizing bacteria, leading to the precipitation of short Fe(III) (oxyhydr)oxides; (2) microbial biomass inhibits abiotic transformation of ferrihydrite to magnetite but that biotic transformation is simply slowed; (3) the Zn and Ni trace element content of magnetite in ancient iron formations could potentially be used as a biomarker to identify microbiological processes.

Publications

• (2018) Microbial anaerobic Fe(II) oxidation – ecology, mechanisms and environmental implications. Environmental Microbiology, 20, 3462-3483
  Bryce, C., Blackwell, N., Schmidt, C., Otte, J., Huang, Y., Kleindienst, S., Tomaszewski, E., Schad, M., Warter, V., Peng, C., Byrne, J.M., Kappler, A.
  (See online at https://doi.org/10.1111/1462-2920.14328)
• (2018) Phytoplankton contributions to the trace element composition of Precambrian banded iron formation. Geological Society of America Bulletin 130, 941- 951
  Konhauser, K.O., Robbins, L.J., Alessi, D.S., Flynn, S.L., Gingras, M.K., Martinez, R.E., Kappler, A., Swanner, E.D., Li, Y.L., Crowe, S.A., Lalonde, S.V.
  (See online at https://doi.org/10.1130/B31648.1)
• (2019) Reusable magnetite nanoparticle – biochar composites for the efficient removal of chromate from water. Scientific Reports
  Alam, S., Bishop, B., Chen, N., Safari, S., Warter, V., Byrne, J.M., Warchola, T., Kappler, A., Konhauser, K.O., Alessi, Daniel
  (See online at https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-75924-7)
• (2020) Effect of Microbial Biomass and Humic Acids on Abiotic and Biotic Magnetite Formation. ES&T
  Han, X., Tomaszewski, E., Sorwat, J., Pan, Y., Kappler, A., Byrne, J.M.
  (See online at https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.9b07095)
• (2020) Oxidation of green rust by anoxygenic phototrophic Fe(II)-oxidizing bacteria. Geochemical Perspectives Letters, 12, 52-57
  Han, X., Tomaszewski, E.J., Sorwat, J., Pan, Y., Kappler, A., Byrne, J.M.
  (See online at https://doi.org/10.7185/geochemlet.2004)