Screening Marine Bacteria for the Isolation of Pollutant-Degrading Strains

Take a seawater sample containing diverse microbes, including environmental pollutant-degrading bacteria.

Serially dilute the sample to reduce microbial density and plate it onto a nutrient medium.

Post-incubation, select morphologically distinct colonies, which may still harbor genetically and metabolically diverse bacterial types.

Streak each selected colony to disperse individual cells and incubate.

Each cell forms a colony, representing a genetically pure bacterial isolate with a distinct metabolic profile.

Inoculate each isolate into a growth medium and incubate to increase biomass.

Centrifuge the culture, discard the supernatant, and wash with a buffer to remove the residual medium.

Resuspend the cells in the buffer and inoculate them into a selection medium containing EE2, an environmental pollutant.

As the sole carbon source in the medium, EE2 selects bacteria that can metabolize it for energy and growth.

Turbidity in the medium indicates bacterial growth, confirming the isolation of the pollutant-degrading bacterial isolate.

To select bacteria, first perform serial dilutions up to 10 to the negative nine in sterile saline solution for coral samples and up to 10 to the negative six f