Isolation,identification and screening of endophytic bacteria antagonistic to biofilm formers

An array of 76 endophytic bacterial isolates obtained from different plant tissues including root,stem and fresh and wilted leaves of various plants in punjab,pakistan were investigated for their antagonistic ability to biofilm formers. the morphological,biochemical and physiological characterization and 16s rrna gene sequence analysis of the selected endophytic isolates leads to the identification of different bacterial species belonging to the genera bacillus,pseudomonas,serratia,stenotrophomonas and micromonospora. the isolates exhibited potent antimicrobial activity against biofilm forming bacterial strains in biological screening by agar diffusion assay. in chemical screening,the crude extracts obtained from each of the isolate and analyzed by thin layer chromatography (tlc) using various spraying reagents and by hplc-uv,exhibited an impressive chemical diversity of the bioactive secondary metabolites. the antimicrobial activity and the chemical diversity exhibited by these endophytic bacterial strains demonstrate that they are a promising source of useful/novel antimicrobial agents,to control the infections caused by biofilm forming bacterial species. © 2012 zoological society of pakistan.