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Cultural characteristics of chromium resistant unicellular cyanobacteria isolated from local environment in Pakistan

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Abstract

Many unicellular cyanobacteria were isolated from different places: fields, ponds, polluted water, and soils from Muredkey and Kasur tannery areas, near Lahore, Pakistan. Different media like BG 11 medium, Bold Basal medium, Chu's #10 medium and Gorham's medium, in standard forms and with slight variations of ingredients, and different pH, temperature and light regimes were checked for the optimum growth of the isolates. The isolation procedure was repeated with different concentrations of chromium to select the resistant strains. These selected strains grew on chromium of the range 100–200 μg/ml in BG 11 medium. Cyanobacteria were maintained in solid and liquid media with/without shaking. Cyanobacterial strains were collected from natural habitats that were accompanied by a diversified group of organisms including bacteria, protozoan, and rotifers etc. In order to eliminate these agents termed as contaminants, we used several methods including phenol treatment, use of antibiotic and careful manual picking of unicellular cyanobacteria. Resistance of these strains against different heavy metals (ZnSO4, MnSO4, NiSO4, CoCl2, Pb(NO3)3, CuSO4, HgCl2, AgNO3 and CdCl2) and antibiotics (erythromycin, streptomycin, kanamyci chloramphenicol, neomycin) was evaluated. Optimum temperature was 30°C with variable pH for the reduction of Cr6+ in to Cr3+ in majority of strains.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Botany, University of the Punjab, Quaid-e-Azam Campus, 54590, Lahore, Pakistan

    Abdul Hameed & Shahida Hasnain

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  1. Abdul Hameed
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  2. Shahida Hasnain
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Correspondence to Abdul Hameed.

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Financially support by the Ministry of Science and Technology, Pakistan.

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Hameed, A., Hasnain, S. Cultural characteristics of chromium resistant unicellular cyanobacteria isolated from local environment in Pakistan. Chin. J. Ocean. Limnol. 23, 433–441 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02842688

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02842688

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