A methanotrophic bacterium to enable direct methane capture for climate mitigation

We report here a methanotroph, Methylotuvimicrobium buryatense 5GB1C, that consumes methane at 500ppm at rates several times higher than any previously published. Analyses of bioreactor-based performance and RNAseq based transcriptomics suggest that this superior ability to utilize low methane is based at least in part on an extremely low non-growth associated maintenance energy and on a 5-fold higher methane specific affinity than previous reports. M. buryatense 5GB1C cultures were grown with 500 ppm or 1000 ppm methane at steady state. Specific growth rates were 0.009 and 0.02 h-1, respectively. RNA samples were collected after three-generation growth.