The_Warrior wrote:
> Hello every one, I'm a biology student in a University, and I truelly need
> your assistance in choosing a good topic for an undergraduate microbiology
> project.
>Try isolating a bacterial virus (bacteriophage = phage) for your
favorite bacterium. Simply identify the bacterium to use and identify
where it can be found in nature (E. coli and sewage samples work very
well, if you make sure you get settled sewage that has not been
chlorinated). Collect a sample of that environmental material, suspend
it is sterile water or use directly if it is an aqueous sample, mix with
an appropriate volume of 10X broth (of a medium that supports good
growth of the bacterium to be used)and add a sample of a culture of your
bacterium. Incubate overnight, centrifuge to remove bacteria, filter
through a 0.45 micron filter and use the supernate as your phage stock.
Plate serial dilutions of the stock on your bacterium by the soft agar
overlay method. Pick isolated plaques and make new stocks of each and
then compare plaque morphology, replication time for the phage, etc.
If interested, I can supply additional specifics of the techniques, as
can many other folks who lurk/post here.
--
Larry D. Farrell, Ph.D.
Professor of Microbiology
Idaho State University
