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The biogeochemical roles of microbes in the Earth system are relatively well known [1], but their biogeophysical roles in Earth history are yet to be investigated. Magnetotactic bacteria (MTB) may have been the earliest organisms to sense Earth’s magnetic field and to form intracellular nanocrystals of magnetic minerals, so-called magnetotaxis and magnetosomes, respectively [2]. These magnetosome minerals are highly resistant to diagenesis and generally well-preserved in sediments or sedimentary rocks as magnetofossils [3], making excellent archives of the biogeophysical activity of microbes. Investigations of magnetosome biogenesis and assembly in MTB are critical not only for understanding the mechanism of biomineralization and the evolution of magnetoreception in organisms, but also for probing magnetofossil records as reliable proxies for paleomagnetic and paleoenvironmental analyses. However …