Isolation of Actinomycetes: A Complete Approach

Actinomycetes have provided many industrially important bioactive compounds having great economic importance and always being a curious organism for secondary metabolite production. Actinomycetes have long been recognized as prolific producers of enzymes, antibiotics, anti cancerous agents and play important role in recycling of organic matter. Numerous methods have been advocated for isolation of actinomycetes to facilitate the discovery of natural compounds specially antibiotics. Isolation of actinomycetes can fulfill all the novel essentialities associated with actinomycetes. Actinomycetes are widely distributed in the natural habitats, hence various methods like pretreatments, enrichment, combinations of antibiotics, specific isolation media and some novel methods has been adapted for isolation. Marine actinomycetes were also isolated by various methods and found to be important source for novel secondary metabolites. Rare actinomycetes isolated by providing combinations of methods or high throughput screening methods. Endophytic actinomycetes can be isolated by mostly chemical treatment for surface sterilization followed by serial dilution. Strategy for a range of isolation methods have been mentioned in this review for discovery of various genera of actinomycetes. K e y w o r d s Actinomycetes, antibiotics, isolation methods, Enrichment