Searching for Antiobiotic-Producing Microbes in Soil

Antibiotic resistance continues to be an ongoing problem globally, and the hunt for new ones is being researched by scientists and students all over the world. Here at JCCC, microbiology students are contributing to this research by learning how to isolate candidates from soil samples that we have found locally. In the lab, we are using aseptic techniques throughout our experiments to minimize the risk of contamination. We used serial dilution and cultured our samples in agar plates. We tested our candidates against ESKAPE pathogens to find out whether there could be a new antibiotic in our samples. We have worked week by week to isolate and further isolate our candidates, starting with making master plates and streak plates. With our candidates, we did Gram staining, spore staining, and acid-fast staining to learn more about our microbes, and have used our findings to narrow down to just one candidate. We are still working to identify our microbes and maybe a student from JCCC will discover the next new antibiotic.