Enrichment of organohalide respiring bacteria

Sampling

Organohalide respiring bacteria are difficult to enrich and isolate, which can limit research on these important organisms. The goal of this research was to develop a method to rapidly (minutes to days) enrich these organisms from a mixed culture or sediment sample. The method presented herein was based on the hypothesis that organohalide respiring bacteria would be more hydrophobic than other bacteria as a result of their niche dehalogenating hydrophobic compounds. To test this hypothesis, a method was developed to separate putative organohalide respiring bacteria at the interface between a hydrophobic organic solvent and aqueous media. This novel separation technique was tested with a sediment-free culture, a tetrachloroethene-enriched digester culture, and sediment from an uncontaminated lake.

Method steps

1. Pipeline used: https://www.ebi.ac.uk/metagenomics/pipelines/4.1