Extremely halophilic Archaea from Tuz Lake, Turkey, and the adjacent Kaldirim and Kayacik salterns

Meral Birbir*, Baris Calli, Bulent Mertoglu, Rahel Elevi Bardavid, Aharon Oren, Mehmet Nuri Ogmen, Ayse Ogan

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

73 Scopus citations

Abstract

Tuz Lake is a hypersaline lake located in Central Anatolia, Turkey. The lake and its salterns, Kaldirim and Kayacik, are the major sources of solar salt for industrial applications in Turkey, especially in the food and leather industries. Use of the crude solar salt often results in microbial deterioration of the products. We therefore initiated a thorough characterization of the microbial communities in Tuz Lake and its adjacent salterns, and we present here the results of investigations on diversity of extremely halophilic Archaea. Twenty-seven colonies of aerobic red or pink Archaea (family Halobacteriaceae) were selected according to colony shape, size, consistency and pigmentation, and characterized according to their phenotypic characteristics, polar lipid contents, and antibiotic sensitivities. Furthermore, 16S rRNA genes of the isolates were screened by DGGE analysis and partially sequenced. Phylogenetic analysis showed that most isolates belonged to the genera Haloarcula, Halorubrum and Halobacterium. Haloarcula was found to be dominant both in Tuz Lake and in the saltern samples. Halorubrum species were isolated from Tuz Lake and from the Kaldirim saltern, and Halobacterium species were recovered from Tuz Lake and from the Kayacik saltern. All strains showed various activities of hydrolytic enzymes (proteases, amylases, cellulases, and others), activities which are responsible for the detrimental effects of the crude salt in food and leather products.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)309-316
Number of pages8
JournalWorld Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
Volume23
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 2007

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
Acknowledgements This work was partially supported by the Scientific Research Project Commission of Marmara University, Project No: 2005 FEN BSE-072/171001. We thank the Scientific Research Project Commission and the Center for Wild Plants and Water Products of Marmara University for supporting this research. Assistant Prof. Yasar Birbir, Assistant Prof. Musa. Sahin Ugur and Mr. Yemilhan Atilgan are acknowledged for supply of the samples. We express our appreciation to Mr. Hüseyin C¸ imen, Mrs. Didem Berber, Miss Selc¸en Durmaz and Miss Hüsniye Hacioglu for their assistance. We thank also Sigma Co. (St Louis, USA) for donating the lipid detection spray reagents.

Keywords

  • Halophilic Archaea
  • Kaldirim saltern
  • Kayacik saltern
  • Tuz Lake

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