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Related Experiment Videos

An optimized enumeration method for sorbitol-fermenting Bifidobacteria in water samples.

Sharon C Long1, Catalina Arango P, Jeanine D Plummer

  • 1Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Massachusetts, Amherst 01003, USA. long@ecs.umass.edu

Canadian Journal of Microbiology
|August 10, 2005
PubMed
Summary

Researchers developed a method to detect human fecal contamination in water using sorbitol-fermenting Bifidobacteria. This microbial source tracking tool aids watershed protection by identifying human waste sources in drinking water.

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Area of Science:

  • Environmental microbiology
  • Water quality monitoring
  • Microbial source tracking

Background:

  • Watershed protection requires microbial source tracking to supplement coliform data.
  • Bifidobacteria, found in human feces, and sorbitol, a human-specific food additive, can indicate human fecal contamination.
  • Existing methods lack specificity for human fecal sources.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To evaluate media and methods for detecting sorbitol-fermenting Bifidobacteria as a human fecal indicator.
  • To validate a methodology for microbial source tracking in environmental waters.

Main Methods:

  • Evaluated seven media types (e.g., Human Bifid Sorbitol agar) with bacterial cultures and fecal samples.
  • Optimized variables including sample preservation, incubation, pH indicators, and plating techniques.

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  • Utilized biochemical tests for confirmation and conducted a year-long field survey.

    • Main Results:

    • Membrane filtration and enumeration on Human Bifid Sorbitol agar with bromocresol purple yielded best presumptive results.
    • False-positives occurred due to non-Bifidobacteria sorbitol-fermenters, necessitating a confirmation step.
    • Field validation confirmed the utility of sorbitol-fermenting Bifidobacteria for human source tracking.

    Conclusions:

    • A validated method using sorbitol-fermenting Bifidobacteria can identify human fecal contamination in environmental waters.
    • Confirmation steps are crucial to avoid false-positives from other sorbitol-fermenting bacteria.
    • This tool enhances drinking water monitoring and watershed protection efforts.