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Pseudomonas pp 255–282Cite as

Heavy Metal Resistance in Pseudomonads

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Abstract

The genomes of pseudomonad`species display a wide variety of adaptive genes which allow them to tolerate heavy metal toxicity. Several resistance systems have been directly characterized by genetic and biochemical tests, whereas other may only be inferred by comparison with the systems encoded in the genomes of other bacteria. This review briefly summarizes the mechanisms of resistance to heavy metals in pseudomonads. For this purpose, metals have been divided into three groups: (i) micronutrient cations that show toxicity (copper, cobalt, nickel, zinc); (ii) nonessential toxic cations (cadmium, lead, mercury, siliver); and (iii) toxic oxyanions (derived from arsenic, chromium, selenium and tellurium). Pseudomonads have evolved two main strategies to cope with heavy metal toxicity: membrane transporters able to efflux toxic ions from the cytoplasm, which include members of the major membrane protein families, and enzymatic redox detoxification pathways, which transform metals to less-toxic forms. Most heavy metal resistance systems in pseudomonads are encoded by complex operons, located on chromosomes or on plasmids, commonly involving delicate regulatory switches functioning at the transcriptional level. The abundance and diversity of genetic determinants conferring metal tolerance in the genomes of pseudomonads may be associated with the varied environments that these versatile bacteria inhabit.

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Acknowledgments

Research in authors’ laboratories was funded by Coordinación de Investigación Científica (UMSNH), Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (No. 79190), COECYT (Michoacán), and DGAPA-UNAM (IN:208308).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto de Investigaciones Químico-Biológicas, Universidad Michoacana, UAM, Morelia, México

    Esther Aguilar-Barajas & Martha I. Ramírez-Díaz

  2. Departamento de Bioquímica, Facultad de Medicina, UNAM, Mexico City, México

    Héctor Riveros-Rosas

  3. Instituto de Investigaciones Químico-Biológicas, Universidad Michoacana, Morelia, México

    Carlos Cervantes

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  1. Esther Aguilar-Barajas
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  2. Martha I. Ramírez-Díaz
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  3. Héctor Riveros-Rosas
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  4. Carlos Cervantes
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Correspondence to Carlos Cervantes .

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  1. C/Prof. Albareda 1, Granada, 18008, Spain

    Juan L. Ramos

  2. Fac. Natural Science, Imperial College London, London, SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom

    Alain Filloux

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Aguilar-Barajas, E., Ramírez-Díaz, M.I., Riveros-Rosas, H., Cervantes, C. (2010). Heavy Metal Resistance in Pseudomonads. In: Ramos, J., Filloux, A. (eds) Pseudomonas. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-3909-5_9

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