Fig 1. Formaldehyde kills M. extorquens at an exponential, concentration-dependent rate.

Formaldehyde was added at the indicated concentrations to liquid cultures of M. extorquens cells growing in minimal medium with methanol, and abundance of viable cells was measured as colony-forming units (CFU) over time. Note that negligible growth is expected to have occurred during the course of this experiment, as the 180-minute duration was less than one generation (~3.5 hrs) for M. extorquens in these conditions. The original data shown in this and all other figures are available in Supporting Information file S1 Data.