bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.09.21.307504; this version posted September 22, 2020. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder. All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. Enhancement of nitrous oxide emissions in soil microbial consortia via copper competition between proteobacterial methanotrophs and denitrifiers Jin Chang,a,b Daehyun Daniel Kim,a Jeremy D. Semrau,b Juyong Lee,a Hokwan Heo,a Wenyu Gu,b* Sukhwan Yoona# aDepartment of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Daejeon, 34141, Korea bDepartment of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, 48109 Running Title: Methanotrophic influence on N2O emissions #Address correspondence to Sukhwan Yoon,
[email protected]. *Present address: Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Stanford University, Palo Alto CA, 94305 bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.09.21.307504; this version posted September 22, 2020. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder. All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. Abstract Unique means of copper scavenging have been identified in proteobacterial methanotrophs, particularly the use of methanobactin, a novel ribosomally synthesized post-translationally modified polypeptide that binds copper with very high affinity. The possibility that copper sequestration strategies of methanotrophs may interfere with copper uptake of denitrifiers in situ and thereby enhance N2O emissions was examined using a suite of laboratory experiments performed with rice paddy microbial consortia. Addition of purified methanobactin from Methylosinus trichosporium OB3b to denitrifying rice paddy soil microbial consortia resulted in substantially increased N2O production, with more pronounced responses observed for soils with lower copper content.