| Magnetotactic bacteria are aquatic prokaryotes that can move under the direction of a local geomagnetic field. The magnetosomes found in magnetotactic bacteria are arranged in a single chain or chains, which is the physics basis of magnetotaxis trait. It is believed that with the trait of magnetotaxis, magnetotactic bacteria can simplify their search for the optimal oxygen environments.;Mms6 is a magnetosome membrane-associated protein in Magnetospirillum magneticum strain AMB-1. It has 59 amino acids with a hydrophobic N-terminal and a hydrophilic C-terminal region. Magnetite nanoparticles with similar size and shape to bacterial magnetite can be synthesized in vitro in the presence of recombinant Mms6.;Our data demonstrated that Mms6 and its C-terminus forms complexes thus may provide the surface for magnetite nanoparticles formation. We examined the sizes and morphologies of magnetite nanoparticle synthesized in the presence of His-Mms6, GST-Mms6 and C25Mms6 by transmission electron microscopy. We used gel filtration and dynamic light scattering to investigated the multimeric states of the various versions of Mms6 we used. The results indicated that the multimeric forms of Mms6 may be required for the successful synthesis of uniform magnetite nanoparticles. A possible mechanism of Mms6 stimulated magnetite nanoparticle formation is proposed. |
