Crystal structure of a key enzyme for anaerobic ethane activation

How to feed an enzyme ethane When released from ocean floor seeps, small hydrocarbons are rapidly consumed by micro-organisms. Methane is highly abundant and both produced microbes through well understood biochemical pathways. Less how ethane, also a major natural component of gaseous hydrocarbons, metabolized. To understand take advantage this energy carbon source, Hahn et al. solved the x-ray crystal structures they call ethyl coenzyme-M reductase, which converts into thioether ethyl-coenzyme M as entry point for catabolism. They found expanded active site and, using xenon gas derivatization experiment, distinctive tunnel protein that proposed permit access substrate. Science , abg1765, issue p. 118