Section A:Introduction Chapter 1 Current and future perspectives on the environmental importance of microorganisms Harold L. Drake and Shuang-Jiang Liu Section B:Microbial Cycling of Elements in Diverse Habitats Chapter 2 Two impossible microbes with global implications:the nitrite-dependent anaerobic oxidation of methane and ammonium Mike Jetten,Huub Op den Camp,Jan Keltjens and Marc Strous Chapter 3 Microbial diversity in the deep-sea environments revealed by combined molecular approaches Xiang Xiao,Fengping Wang and Jun Meng Chapter 4 Exploring an unknown world:bacteria of the deep biosphere below the seafloor Heribert Cypionka Chapter 5 Temperature effects on methanogenic microbial communities Ralf Conrad Chapter 6 Microbial diversity under long-term fertilization regimes of Chinese soils Ji-zheng He Chapter 7 Functional gene assessment of denitrifying Prokaryotes:implications for understanding the ecology of denitrifiers Sara Hallin Chapter 8 Uncultured microorganisms in Hainan mangrove soil:diversity and functional genes Kui Hong and Bing Yan Chapter 9 Acetogens:anaerobic gamblers at the oxic-anoxic interface 59 Harold L. Drake and Anita S. G??ner Chapter 10 Phosphorus cycling at water:sediment interface mediated by phosphorus-solublizing bacteria Hong-Li Yuan and Jian-Hang Qu Chapter 11 Planktonic bacteria in Chinese and European lakes:are they different? Martin W. Hahn and Qinglong L. Wu Chapter 12 Phototrophic consortia:model systems for the interaction between nonrelated bacteria Jorg Overmann Section C:Bioremediation and Bioaugmentation:Harnessing Microbes Chapter 13 Microbial degradation of carbazole and dibenzofuran by Genus Sphingomonas:perspective and challenge Ping Xu,Zhonghui Gai,Bo Yu and Cuiqing Ma Chapter 14 Microbiology and application of biological sulfate reduction Alfons J. M. Stams,Piet N.L. Lens,Cees J.N. Buisman,Albert J. H. Janssen and Gerard Muyzer Chapter 15 Effect of oil contamination and bioremediation on bacterial communities in polar sea-ice environments Elisabeth Helmke and Birte Gerdes Chapter 16 Diverse strategies of polychlorophenol degradation by microorganisms Luying Xun Chapter 17 Microbial iron oxidation and the degradation of persistent organic pollutants Ulrich Szewzyk,Songyan Qin,Burga Braun,Oliver Thronicker,Uta B?ckelmann and Martin Meixner Chapter 18 Effect of metal-reducing microorganisms on element fluxes in a former uranium-mining district Kirsten Küsel,Eva-Maria Burkhardt and Jana Sitte Chapter 19 Reductive dehalogenation of chlorinated aromatic compounds by anaerobic bacteria Ute Lechner and Anke Wagner Chapter 20 Degradation and assimilation of aromatic compounds by Corynebacterium glutamicum Shuang-Jiang Liu and Muhammad Tausif Chaudhry Chapter 21 Host-vector systems for hyperthermophilic archaeon Sulfolobus Qunxin She,Ling Deng,Haojun Zhu,Maria Dreibr?l,Mariana Awayez and Yunxiang Liang Index