Isolation And Identification Of Bacillus Anthracis From The Gut Of Earthworm Fed With Chromium Accumulated Eichhornia Crassipes

Abstract

This study aimed to isolate and identify gut bacteria from Eisenia fetida fed with chromium contaminated Eichhornia crassipes. Earthworm gut content was serially diluted and plated to isolate bacteria, followed by purification using the fourquadrant streak method. Among the isolates, one bacterial strain was high resistance to chromium, tolerating concentrations up to 1000 ppm with no evident of inhibition zone in the disc diffusion assay.  Genomic DNA was extracted from the bacterial isolate obtained from the earthworm gut and subjected to 16S rRNA gene sequencing. The amplified sequence was analyzed and showed 99.86% similarity with Bacillus anthracis. The nucleotide sequence was submitted to the NCBI GenBank database under the Accession No. OQ568517. These findings suggest that B. anthracis may be part of the microbial community associated with chromium tolerance or transformation in the earthworm gut environment.