Azospirillum brasilense

Azospirillum brasilense is a very well studied, nitrogen-fixing (diazotroph), genetically tractable, Gram-negative, alpha-proteobacterium bacterium, first described in Brazil (in a publication in 1978) by the group of Johanna Döbereiner and then receiving the name "brasilense".

[1] A. brasilense is able to fix nitrogen in the presence of low oxygen levels, making it a microaerobic diazotroph.

An isolate from the genus Azospirillum was isolated from nitrogen poor soils in the Netherlands in 1925, however the species A. brasilense was first described in 1978 in Brazil,[1] since this genus is widely found in the rhizospheres of grasses around the world where it confers plant growth promotion.

[2][3] Whether growth promotion occurs through direct nitrogen flux from the bacteria to the plant or through hormone regulation is debated.

[5] Sp245 can be transformed with OriV origin of replication plasmids through conjugation and electroporation.

A. brasilense promoting the growth of Setaria viridis , a model plant for Zea mays (corn).
Annotated 42kbp genetic context of the nitrogenase genes in A. brasilense Sp245 compiled from raw sequencing data. [ 7 ] There are a total of 45 genes, 26 of them annotated by homology , 8 putative functions, 11 completely unknown and no homologs.