Metabolic profiling of petroleum-degrading microbial communities incubated under high-pressure conditions

Jinbo Xu; Lu Wang; Weifeng Lv; Xinmin Song; Yong Nie; Xiao-Lei Wu

doi:10.3389/fmicb.2023.1305731

Metabolic profiling of petroleum-degrading microbial communities incubated under high-pressure conditions

Front Microbiol. 2023 Dec 22:14:1305731. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2023.1305731. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Jinbo Xu^#^{1

2}, Lu Wang^#², Weifeng Lv², Xinmin Song², Yong Nie³, Xiao-Lei Wu^{3

4}

Affiliations

¹ School of Earth and Space Sciences, Peking University, Beijing, China.
² State Key Laboratory of Enhanced Oil and Gas Recovery, Research Institute of Petroleum Exploration and Development, Beijing, China.
³ College of Engineering, Peking University, Beijing, China.
⁴ Institute of Ecology, Peking University, Beijing, China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

While pressure is a significant characteristic of petroleum reservoirs, it is often overlooked in laboratory studies. To clarify the composition and metabolic properties of microbial communities under high-pressure conditions, we established methanogenic and sulfate-reducing enrichment cultures under high-pressure conditions using production water from the Jilin Oilfield in China. We utilized a metagenomics approach to analyze the microbial community after a 90-day incubation period. Under methanogenic conditions, Firmicutes, Deferribacteres, Ignavibacteriae, Thermotogae, and Nitrospirae, in association with the hydrogenotrophic methanogen Archaeoglobaceae and acetoclastic Methanosaeta, were highly represented. Genomes for Ca. Odinarchaeota and the hydrogen-dependent methylotrophic Ca. Methanosuratus were also recovered from the methanogenic culture. The sulfate-reducing community was dominated by Firmicutes, Thermotogae, Nitrospirae, Archaeoglobus, and several candidate taxa including Ca. Bipolaricaulota, Ca. Aminicenantes, and Candidate division WOR-3. These candidate taxa were key pantothenate producers for other community members. The study expands present knowledge of the metabolic roles of petroleum-degrading microbial communities under high-pressure conditions. Our results also indicate that microbial community interactions were shaped by syntrophic metabolism and the exchange of amino acids and cofactors among members. Furthermore, incubation under in situ pressure conditions has the potential to reveal the roles of microbial dark matter.

Keywords: metagenomics; methanogenesis; oil reservoir; pressure; sulfate-reducing.

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This work was supported by National Key R&D Program of China (2018YFA0902100 and 2021YFA0910300) and National Natural Science Foundation of China (32161133023, 32130004, 91951204, and 32170113).