Microbes World

The Origin, Evolution and

Classification of Microbial Life

Opalescent Pool in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

USA. Conditions for life in this environment are similar
to Earth over 2 billion years ago.
In these types of hot springs:
• Orange, yellow and brown colors are due to
pigmented photosynthetic bacteria  microbial
mats.
• The mats are literally teeming with bacteria.
• Some of these bacteria such as
▫ Synechococcus conduct oxygenic photosynthesis,
▫ Chloroflexus, conduct anoxygenic photosynthesis.
▫ Other non-photosynthetic bacteria, as well as
thermophilic and acidophilic Archaea, are also
residents of the hot spring community.
THE ORIGIN OF CELLULAR LIFE
• 4 billion years ago, the first types of cells to
evolve were procaryotic cells
▫ The oldest known sedimentary rocks found in Greenland are
about 3.8 billion years old
▫ The oldest known fossils are procaryotic cells, 3.5 billion years in
age, found in Western Australia and South Africa
• The nature of fossils, and the chemical
composition of the rocks in which they are
found, indicates that these first cells made use of
simple chemical reactions to produce energy for
their metabolism and growth
Chemolithtorophy and Chemoheterotrophy
• The primitive earth's atmospheric gases: ammonia
(NH3), hydrogen (H2) and hydrogen sulfide (H2S) as
source of energy
▫ The use of inorganic chemicals as a source of energy is
called chemolithtorophy
▫ the use of organic chemicals as energy sources is called
chemoheterotrophy
▫ chemolithotrophy and chemoheterotrophy, were the first
two types of metabolism to evolve
• An important group of archaea that were involved in this
process were the methanogens : grow by using H2 as
an energy source and CO2 as a carbon source 
methane (CH4) the simplest organic matter.
Photosynthesis
• Developed in bacteria about 3.2 billion years ago
• The first type of photosynthesis to appear is
called anoxygenic photosynthesis because it
does not produce O2
• oxygenic photosynthesis also arose in
procaryotes: cyanobacteria, and existed for
millions of years before the evolution of plants
A timescale for major events in evolution of the
first (procaryotic) cells
 First microorganisms?

Formation of
Cyanobacterial microfossils algae,
O2
(oxygenic photosynthesis) marine invertebrates
Earth formed atmosphere insects
mammals

4.5 4.0 3.5 3.0 2.5 2.0 1.5 1.0 0.5 0

No free O2
Reducing environment BYA
Endosymbiosis
• Endosymbiosis is the
name given to processes
wherein one cell lives
inside of another cell
• Endosymbiosis between
early eucaryotes and
bacterial cells that has
given rise to eucaryotic
chlorplasts and
mitochondria
TAXONOMY AND CLASSIFICATION OF
MICROBES

• Three Kingdom System (1866)

• Four Kingdom System (circa 1950)
• Five Kingdom System (1967)
• Carl Woese's Three Domain System
(1988)
• The Universal Tree of Life
Three Kingdom
• Haeckel (1866) was the first to create a natural
Kingdom for the microorganisms
• discovered nearly two centuries before by
Antony van Leeuwenhoek
• Haeckel placed all unicellular (microscopic)
organisms in a new kingdom, "Protista",
separated from plants (Plantae) and animals
(Animalia)
Four Kingdom System (circa 1950)
• development of the electron microscope in the
1950's revealed a fundamental dichotomy among
Haeckel's "Protista":
• some cells contained a membrane-enclosed nucleus,
and some cells lacked this intracellular structure
• The latter were temporarily shifted to a fourth
kingdom, Monera (or Moneres), the procaryotes
(also called Procaryotae)
• Protista remained as a kingdom of unicellular
eucaryotic microorganisms
Five Kingdom System (1967)

• Whittaker refined the

system into five
kingdoms in 1967
• Fungi as a separate
multicellular
eucaryotic kingdom
• Distinguished by their
absorptive mode of
nutrition
Carl Woese's Three Domain System (1988)
• phylogenetic analysis of all forms of cellular life based on
comparative sequencing of the small subunit ribosomal RNA
(ssrRNA)
• Setteled for the ssrRNA due to:
▫ rRNA is found in all cells
▫ rRNA is present in thousands of copies and is easy to isolate from
cells
▫ rRNA can be analyzed to determine the exact sequence of
nucleotide bases in its makeup
▫ The sequence of bases in RNA is a complementary COPY of the
sequence of bases in the gene (DNA) that encodes for RNA
▫ Base sequences in different rRNA molecules can be compared by
computer analyses and statistical methods to reveal precise
similarities and differences in cellular genomes
The Universal Tree of Life
• On the basis of
small subunit
ribosomal RNA
(ssrRNA) analysis
 three cellular
domains of life:
Archaea,
Bacteria, and
Eucarya
 Notes on the Tree

• Archaea are the least evolved type of cell

▫ They remain closest to the common point of
origin
▫ Env. : hot, salty, acidic, anaerobic, low in
organic material, etc.
• Eucaryotes (Eucarya) are the most
evolved type of cell
• Mitochondria and the respiratory
bacterium, Agrobacterium, are derived
from a common ancestor
▫ likewise, chloroplast and the cyanobacterium,
Synechococcus, arise from a common origin 
good evidence for the idea of
evolutionary endosymbiosis
There are more genetic
differences between E.
coli and Bacillus than there
are between humans and a
paramecium

Humans (Homo) are

more closely related to
yeast (Saccharomyces)
than they are to corn (Zea)
Size and Distribution of Bacteria and
Archaea
• Most procaryotic cells are very small compared
to eukaryotic cells
• A typical bacterial cell is about 1 micrometer in
diameter while most eukaryotic cells are from 10
to 100 micrometers in diameter
• Eukaryotic cells have a much greater volume of
cytoplasm and a much lower surface : volume
ratio than procaryotic cells
• A typical procaryotic cell is about the size of a
eukaryotic mitochondrion
procaryotes are most abundant form
of life on the planet
• Both biomass and total numbers of species
• in the sea:
▫ procaryotes make up 90 percent of the total combined
weight of all organisms
• agricultural soil
▫ In a single gram of fertile agricultural soil there may be
in excess of 109 bacterial cells,
▫ bacteria: eukaryotic cells = 10,000 : 1
• 3,000 distinct species of bacteria and archea are
recognized, but this number is probably less than
one percent of all the species in nature
Their Live
• Procaryotes are found in all of the habitats
where eukaryotes live and in many natural
environments considered too extreme or
inhospitable for eukaryotic cells
• Where eukaryotes and procaryotes live
together, there may be mutualistic
associations between the organisms that
allow both to survive or flourish
• The organelles of eukaryotes (mitochondria and
chloroplasts) are thought to be remnants of Bacteria
that invaded, or were captured by, primitive
eukaryotes in the evolutionary past
From a metabolic standpoint
• procaryotes are extraordinarily diverse, and they
exhibit several types of metabolism that are rarely or
never seen in eukaryotes
▫ nitrogen fixation (conversion of atmospheric
nitrogen gas to ammonia)
▫ methanogenesis (production of methane)
• The lives of plants and animals are dependent upon
the activities of bacterial cells
• in soil habitats: procaryotes are absolutely
essential to drive the cycles of elements that make
up living systems, i.e., the carbon, oxygen, nitrogen
and sulfur cycles
Bacteria or bacterial products
• can be used to increase crop yield or plant
resistance to disease, or to cure or prevent
plant disease
• antibiotics to fight infectious disease, as
well as components for vaccines used to prevent
infectious disease
• provide convenient laboratory models for
study of the molecular biology, genetics, and
physiology of all types of cells, including plant
and animal cells
Structure of eucaryotic and
procaryotic cells
• Procaryotic cells (archaea and bacteria) and
eucaryotic cells (both unicellular and multicellular
eucaryotes) have evolved as two distinct types
of cells
• Eucaryotes always contain :
▫ a membrane-enclosed nucleus, multiple
chromosomes, and various other membranous
organelles, such as mitochondria, chloroplasts, the
golgi apparatus, vacuoles, etc
• Procaryotic cells are much typically :
• smaller in size and never contain a nuclear membrane
around their genetic material
Fig. 1.13
Differences
 Property Biological Domain

Eucarya Bacteria Archaea

Cell configuration Eukaryotic procaryotic procaryotic

Nuclear membrane Present absent absent

# chromosomes >1 1 1

Chromosome
topology linear circular circular

Murein in cell wall - + -

 Property Biological Domain

Eucarya Bacteria Archaea

Meiosis and mitosis present absent absent

Transcription and
translation coupled - + +
Amino acid initiating
protein Methionine N-formyl methionine methionine
Inhibition by
streptomycin and
chloramphenicol - + -
Inhibition by
diphtheria toxin + - +
 Property Biological Domain

Eucarya Bacteria Archaea

ester-linked
ester-linked glycerides;
glycerides; unbranched;
Cell membrane unbranched; saturated or ether-linked
lipids polyunsaturated monounsaturated branched; saturated
Cell membrane
sterols present absent absent
mitochondria and
chloroplasts present absent absent

Ribosome size 80S (cytoplasmic) 70S 70S