A new paper from the Giovannoni lab was published this week in Nature Microbiology on the unexpected discovery that SAR11 bacteria produce methane thiol and DMS from DMSP metabolism. Our role on this paper was to measure real time production of these compounds using PTR-MS. Overall, the research described in this paper combined culturing, biochemistry, genomics, proteomics, and atmospheric chemistry to reveal the remarkable activities of this tiny, abundant, and remarkably impactful bacterium.
Sun et al. 2016_Nat_Microbiol.