First identified in Nitrospira inopinata in 2016, the potential for the process had long been hypothesised for decades, it was not till the advent of modern genome analysis that the AmoA gene and hydroxylamine oxidoreductase (hao) gene cluster were identified, confirming the process and the species capable of exploiting it.
As interesting as this is, like ammonox, it's a low weight contributor to the entire bacterial nitrogen cycle, but does go to show that knowing what we don't know is key to knowing what we will know.
