Streptomycin-Producing Capacity of Different Strains of Streptotnyces griseus ∗†

Abstract

Summary

Evidence is presented that the original culture of S. griseus which was isolated from different soils, in 1915-1916, in the laboratories of the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station must have possessed the capacity for producing streptomycin. This capacity was lost upon continuous growth of the culture upon artificial media for more than 30 years. When irradiated, this culture yielded a mutant that was as potent a producer of streptomycin as the streptomycin-yielding strains of S. griseus isolated in 1943.

This assumption was fully confirmed by the characteristic antibiotic spectrum of the two cultures, their behavior to streptomycin-dependent and streptomycin-resistant mutants of E. coli and other bacteria, and sensitivity of the two cultures to the same actinophage.

These results further point to the accuracy of the identification of the streptomycin-producing cultures of S. griseus with that of the original 1915 isolate, based on literature description alone, in spite of the fact that the type culture available in two collection's showed distinct changes from the original description.