Peristance of bacteria in the presence of viable, nonencysting, bacterivorous ciliates

Laboratory studies of the interactions between a bacterial population and a population of bacterivorous ciliates consistently show that the bacteria are able to persist in the presence of viable ciliates. Reproduction of the bacteria, presumably at the expense of substrates produced by death and lysis of the ciliates and/or by their metabolic activity, has been suggested to be a factor involved in the observed bacterial persistence. Rates and extents of growth ofEscherichia coli in broths of mixed cultures of this bacterium and the ciliateTetrahymena pyriformis were determined in order to provide some data necessary to assess the importance of the suggested factor. In addition, an attempt was made to suppress bacterial growth on produced substrates so that feeding of the ciliates could be studied free of this complication. However, the procedure tested-addition of the antibiotic chloramphenicol (CM) at a concentration of 150μg/ml-led to other complications that made it impossible to obtain the desired information about feeding.