Understanding the function of an unknown bacterial microcompartment

Bacterial microcompartments are proteinaceous units that are often involved in metabolic processes. These structures are composed of a proteinaceous outer shell that encases numerous enzymes. When a bacterial microcompartment comes in contact with its substrate, it serves as a catalytic unit, degrading the metabolite into respective byproducts. There are numerous microcompartments, however, a novel microcompartment has been discovered in the soil isolate KNHS206. Numerous genes in the operon have annotations that do not suggest an obvious metabolic pathway. Therefore, in order to understand the function of this microcompartment, multiple growth conditions were tested based off of predictions from the annotated genes present in the operon. It was found that the strain grows on minimal media supplemented with rhamnose and glycerol, respectively. High performance liquid chromatography was performed in the hopes to elucidate what the substrate the microcompartment uses and what byproducts are formed as a result. Lastly, qualitative polymerase chain reaction was conducted in order to confirm that the novel microcompartment is expressed under the various growth conditions.