If I want to isolate microorganisms producing antimicrobial natural products, what is the best source for these microorganisms I should isolate from; clinical, environmental or both? Please provide links if you have any.
Dear Sebak,
Generally clinical microorganisms are pathogenic in nature. They do produce antimicrobials as produced by environmental microorganisms but they are not in abundant type (means less diverse microbes) whereas in environment (water/soil), environment acts as a natural habitat for abundant microorganisms, and are non-pathogenic or can say not much pathogenic in nature. Env. microbes are easy to handle, culturable and easy to maintain.
Clinical microbes need complex growth requirements (as generally they feed and habitat on human/animal) and while working with them one may get infected with them. (*No doubt in clinics or in research centres/institutions clinical microorganisms are well handled but need utmost care and precautions).
If your institution has well established labs to handle pathogenic microorganisms and you are perfectly trained then you can go for clinical microbes otherwise environmental microorganisms are promising in antimicrobial detection studies.
We can not say that which type of microorganism is better (env or clinical) but compared to clinical microorganisms, environmental microorgaisms are diverse and abundant (contains diverse types of bacterial, fungi or actinomycetes). So, I suggest you to go for Environmental microorganisms (bacterial/fungi/actinomycetes) for antimicrobial production detection.
Hope this will help you in your research.
Thanks
I would say it depends on the aim of your study! Due to several issues with using clinical isolates (potential need for bioethical approval, pathogenicity of the organisms, need for a BSL lab, etc) it is probably easier to work with environmental strains. However it all depends on your study! Good luck!
Hello,
It depends on your aims. If it is just for study and isolate some strains from a sample, you can use any kind of sample to isolate these kinds of microorganisms. BUT if the long-term aim of your study is to produce a new antibiotics, you should always keep in mind that Industrial strains MUST be non-pathogen.
however I think that soil is the best one.
Dear Sebak,
In order to evaluate antimicrobial activity of natural products derived from microorganisms, at first step, officially test strains (from valid collections such as ATCC) must be used. Invironmental and clinical microorganisms may have resistant factors (gene, plasmid .....) and are not suitable for this purpose. At second step, in comparison to other standard antibiotics and antimicrobials, invironmental and clinical microorganisms accordig to your research aims are suggested.
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