Advancing microbial isolation: The impact of leaf mold extract agar on soil samples
説明
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>In this study, we developed a new agar medium using leaf mold extract and evaluated its microbial cultivation performance with soil samples. As a control for performance evaluation, the general-purpose nutrient medium YME agar was used. For YME agar, isolated microbes were confirmed to belong mainly to the<jats:italic>Bacillus</jats:italic>genus through 16S rRNA gene sequencing. In contrast, for the leaf mold agar, bacteria belonging to either<jats:italic>Streptomyces</jats:italic>or<jats:italic>Rhizobium</jats:italic>were frequently isolated. Also, of the 51 sequenced isolates on the leaf mold agar medium, an unidentified species (i.e., not listed in databases) with 16S rRNA sequence identity below 98.7% was found. The unidentified species did not grow in standard nutrient media (YME, BHI, LB10, or TSB) but grew in 10% leaf mold extract. The findings of this study suggest that the use of leaf mold agar medium can effectively isolate soil microbes that are difficult to culture in general-purpose nutrient media such as YME. Moreover, this approach indicates a viable method for discovering unknown, previously-uncultured microbial species from soil samples.</jats:p>