What is cheap and quick method of inducing sporulation in Bacillus species?
Sporulation in most members of the family which includes Bacillus occurs when nutrients are depleted, wastes build up, pH changes (acidity increases, often due to waste build up), and/or drying occurs. So try your species (strain) with these methods, but most importantly try to see if the method allows you to do what you need to do with the endospores once they have developed.
Oh, these are all cheap and fairly quick (normally within a few days). The bigger problem is how are you going to use the endospores, and thus obtain these from the growth media.
I would suggest using the casein hydrolysate medium to stimulate the sporulation. Suggest that diluting the medium after the growth stage to five the stimulating condition and then use the 80 C temperature to eliminate non sporulating cells and drying to get the dry product that is stored in cool dry conditions.
Actually you need to mention little details both about the strain characters and your scope of work. Sporulation in Bacillus is neither difficult nor costly. Suppose if you are working with mesophilic Bacillus subtilus, streak the bacteria on nutrient agar medium and incubate at 45 or 50 C, you will get spores in 24 hrs. So grow it under nutritional or environmental stress condition, you will get the results.
Thanks for your response but I want to do at bulk scale, like 100 liter of culture and induce sporulation in that. I want to use these as biofertilizers.
It seems that bulk scale would be similar to what we have all described, just larger culture vessels. As the bacteria grow and use up the nutrients, and yes addition of water during the growth could speed up the sporulation process, it seems you could then use this liquid culture as a spray to be used as a biofertilizer. In this way you use the remaining nutrients in a beneficial manner and the moisture could help the germination of the spores in the system. I am assuming these bacteria will be able to add something to the soil, such as nitrogen fixation.
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Agricultural Science
- Agronomy
- Crop Science
- Crop