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Date:
July 3, 2014
Source:
Northeastern University
Summary:
Millions of microbial species populate the world, but
so far only a few have been identified due to the inability of most microbes to
grow in the laboratory. An engineer and a biologist aim to change this. The
pair has developed a device that allows scientists to cultivate a single
species of bacteria that can then be studied and identified.
..........................
Millions of microbial species populate the world, but so far
only a few have been identified due to the inability of most microbes to grow
in the laboratory. Edgar Goluch, an engineer, and Slava Epstein, a biologist,
aim to change this. The pair, both researchers at Northeastern University, has
developed a device that allows scientists to cultivate a single species of
bacteria that can then be studied and identified.
Goluch's
previous research devices incorporated permeable membranes that allow
sequestered bacteria to be exposed to the nutrients and molecules of their
native environment. But natural competition between species, even in the wild,
has so far limited the number of species of bacteria that biologists have been able
to isolate with these methods and in traditional lab settings.
Goluch and
Epstein's device, detailed in a paper released July 1 in the journal PLOS
ONE, solves this problem. This new device permits just a single bacterial
cell to enter an inner chamber containing a food source, to which the only
access is a microscopic passageway just slightly narrower than a single cell.
The passageway is so small that the first cell to enter it gets stuck, blocking
entry by any other cell or species. Once inside, this cell pro-liferates as in
previous devices, and when it does it fills up the inner chamber with a pure,
single-species sample, since it is isolated from competition from other
species.
In the
paper, the team demonstrates the device's ability to separate mixtures of cell
types in a laboratory setting. In one experiment, the researchers separated two
different bacterial species whose cells are slightly different sizes -- E.
coli and P. aueruginosa. In a second experiment, they isolated a
combination of similarly sized but differently shaped species that commonly
show up together in the marine environment -- Roseobacter sp. and Pscyhoserpens
sp. Finally, they used the device to separate cells of the same species
that had been differentially tagged to glow either red or green. This final
experiment validates the hypothesis that the cells grown inside the food
chamber are daughters of the single cell caught in the entryway. Epstein will
test the devices in the biological setting beginning this month during a research
trip to Greenland.
Going
forward, funding from an Instrument Development Biological Research Grant from
the National Science Foundation will enable Goluch and his team of engineers to
begin optimizing the device and its manufacture on a larger scale.
Story
Source:
The above
story is based on materials provided by Northeastern University. Note: Materials may be edited for
content and length.
Journal
Reference:
- Nil Tandogan, Pegah N. Abadian, Slava Epstein, Yoshiteru Aoi, Edgar D. Goluch. Isolation of Microorganisms Using Sub-Micrometer Constrictions. PLoS ONE, 2014; 9 (6): e101429 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0101429
