Microbial extraction of sulfur from model coal organosulfur compounds

TL;DRAbstract

Several hundred bacterial cultures isolated from a variety of natural sites were screened for their ability to desulfurize the model coal organosulfur compounds, dibenzothiophene (DBT) and DBT-sulfone. A sulfur-stress assay, in which DBT-sulfone was the only bioavailable source of sulfur, was used to screen and select for organisms that selectively desulfurized the organic-sulfur substrate. Only two new isolates, UMX9 and UMX3, and strain IGTS-8, a Rhodococcus rhodochrous provided by the Institute for Gas Technology (Chicago, USA.) as a reference culture, would grow on DBT or DBT-sulfone as a sole source of sulfur. Under sulfur-stress conditions, a desulfurized product identified as 2-hydroxybiphenyl (2-phenylphenol) was detected only for UMX9 and IGTS-8. Biodesulfurization activity for all three organisms occurred only for growing cultures, and was depressed by free sulfate, although more so for UMX3 and IGTS-8 than for UMX9. None of the three cultures exhibited good growth on DBT, DB

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