Resumo

VALENCIA-CANTERO, Eduardo. Bacteria and their organelles, a historical perspective. TIP [online]. 2025, vol.28, e.2025.744.  Epub 30-Abr-2026. ISSN 1405-888X.  https://doi.org/10.22201/fesz.23958723e.2025.744.

Bacteria are tiny organisms that are difficult to observe using conventional techniques and whose interior cannot be studied using an optical microscope. Defining bacteria in simple morphological terms is a difficult task; hence, the “classical” definition of bacteria as cellular organisms lacking internal membranes, although incorrect, remains widely accepted. Bacteria have dozens of types of organelles, understood as subcellular structures, delimited by biological membranes with proteomes and physiologies that characterize them. In this mini-review from a historical perspective, the first organelles described are emphasized, focusing on those related to the processes of obtaining energy and carbon fixation in phototrophic and chemotrophic bacteria (chromatophores, thylakoids, chlorosomes, carboxysomes, anammoxosomes and energy vacuoles), on those that allow magnetotaxis (magnetosomes), and on those that concentrate most of the cellular activity in the organisms that possess them (pirellulosomes) and that can even revolutionize the conception we have of bacteria (pepins).

Palavras-chave : definition of bacteria; bacterial cell compartmentalization; phototrophic organelles; bacterial vacuoles; pepins.

        · resumo em Espanhol     · texto em Espanhol     · Espanhol ( pdf )