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Methanobacterium thermoautotrophicum was first isolated from “fresh, fermenting sludge” from the sewage treatment plant located in Urbana, Illinois. J.G. Zeikus and R.S. Wolfe of the University of Illinois first cultured M. thermoautotrophicum in 1971(Zeikus and Wolfe 1973). Contrary to the suggestion of its name, M. thermoautotrophicum does not belong to the classification of bacteria, but rather archaea. More specifically it falls in the classification of archaebacteria (Smith DR et al. 1997). These microorganisms are closely related to bacteria in size and structure, but differ chemically and in their molecular structure. One of the key separations from bacterial classification observed in M. thermoautotrophicum is in the chemical composition of its cell wall. It consists of pseudomurein, where bacterial cell walls are composed of peptidoglycan (Smith DR., et al. 1997).