Members of the B. cereus sensu lato group are known to
produce and utilize two siderophores, bacillibactin (Fig. 1a,
boxed structure) and petrobactin (Fig. 2a, boxed structure)
(Koppisch et al., 2005; Wilson et al., 2006). Both are
considered catechol-based siderophores, in that the metal
is bound in the holo-siderophore either partially (petrobactin)
or entirely (bacillibactin) by dihydroxybenzoate
(DHB) units. Although both molecules are chemically
capable of binding and solubilizing iron, genetic, biochemical
and virulence studies indicate that they play markedly
different biological functions in the bacteria