ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Microbiol.
Sec. Microbiological Chemistry and Geomicrobiology
Enrichment and Comparative Metagenomics of Microbes Involved in Biocorrosion of Gas Transport or Storage Steel Infrastructure
Provisionally accepted
- 1Gas Technology Institute, Des Plaines, United States
- 2US Army Corps of Engineers, Champaign, United States
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Biocorrosion, also known as microbiologically influenced corrosion (MIC), is the deterioration of metals caused by microbial activities that compromise the structural integrity, reliability, and safety of steel infrastructure. To identify the genetic determinants that MIC-causing microorganisms may use to attack steel infrastructure, field samples from natural gas infrastructure with a potential history of MIC were collected, enriched for different MIC categories, and subjected to whole-genome shotgun sequencing for metagenomic analysis. Biofilms were grown on carbon steel coupons or glass slides as attachment substrates to assess differences in microbial community composition and metabolic activities. The highest corrosion activities were observed in enrichments dominated by acid-producing bacteria (APB) and hydrogen-utilizing bacteria. APB enrichments resulted in the highest accumulation of organic acids and a severe decrease in culture fluid pH. A total of 57 metagenome-assembled genomes were recovered from the biofilms, some of which differed between carbon steel coupons and glass slide substrates. The metagenomes contained most of the known genes implicated in MIC and sulfide production, with substantial variation in estimated gene copy numbers among metagenomes and attachment substrates. Overall, comparative analysis of these biofilm metagenomes enriched from natural gas production and processing infrastructure highlights similarities to microbial communities commonly observed in oil production and processing systems and provides an overview of candidate genes that may be used as molecular probes for MIC.
Keywords: Biofilm, Culture enrichment, Hydrogensulfide, Metagenome, Microbiologically influenced corrosion
Received: 19 Dec 2025; Accepted: 16 Feb 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Way, Sherman, Leleika, Crippen, Wilson and Fida. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Tekle Tafese Fida
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.