A simple classification method for residual antibiotics using E. coli cells transformed by the calcium chloride...

Using three different plasmid DNA codings for kanamycin (KM), chloramphenicol (CP), and ampicillin- (AMP) and tetracycline- (TC) resistance, four different competent Escherichia coli strains were transformed by the calcium chloride method to produce KM-, CP- and AMP- and TC-resistant strains. Evaluation of minimum inhibitory concentrations (MIC) of 22 antibiotics, showed KM-resistant E. coli to be cross resistant only to fradiomycin (FRM); CP-resistant E. coli, especially HB101 and JM109 strains, exhibited cross-resistance only to thiamphenicol (TP). On the other hand, AMP- and TC-resistant E. coli showed cross resistance to several penicillins, tetracyclines and erythromycin. E. coli ATCC-27166, the strain most sensitive to all drugs in this experiment, was employed for disc diffusion experiments and from the pattern of appearance of the inhibition zone, eight major antibiotics were divided into three groups depending on their activity against containing each of the three plasmids. Only gentamicin (GM) activity was not affected by any of the drug resistant strains. Assay techniques utilizing three resistant strains may be the technique for screening foods for antibiotic residues in the future.