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Research addresses potential bias in the polymerase chain reaction and their influence on terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism fingerprinting of methanogenic bacterial population structure in different habitats using small-subunit rRNA and the methyl-coenzyme M reductase genes as probes. Data reveal that small-subunit rRNA analysis is reproducible, whereas M reductase-based analysis is biased.

Different methanogenic bacteria are stimulated or inhibited when rice paddy soils are supplemented with ferrihydrite or gypsum. These electron acceptors are added to stimulate bacteria that would compete with methanogens. This is done to reduce methane emissions, which contribute to the greenhouse effect.

The first comprehensive analysis of the microbial community inside the gut of the termite Cubitermes orthognathus is described based on clonal analysis and terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism fingerprinting. This is also the first report of Crenarchaeota occurring in an arthropod intestinal tract.

Research has been conducted on the Archaea population dynamics after rice field soil flooding. The results of the molecular sequence retrieval and small-subunit rRNA gene fingerprinting are discussed.

The characterization of microbial community distribution across a high-resolution depth profile of a tar oil-impacted aquifer where benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene (BTEX) degradation has depended mainly on sulfate reduction is described. The results have shown that the distribution of specific aquifer microbiota and degradation processes in contaminated aquifers are tightly coupled, which are used for the assessment of natural attenuation based on intrinsic aquifer microbiota.

The first identification of active anaerobic microorganisms by stable-isotope probing (SIP), which are involved in the thermodyanimically unfavorable syntrophic oxidation of propionate under methanogenic conditions is presented. Three distinct lineages of syntrophic propionate oxidizers (Syntrophobacter, Smithella, and Pelotomaculum spp.) were identified to operate simultaneously in anoxic rice field soil slurries and their hydrogenotrophic and acetotrophic methanogenic partner organisms were also detected by assimilation of labeled intermediates.