Isolation and molecular characterization of thermophilic actinomyctes and investigation of their effects in compost mixtures

Postgraduate thesis about "Isolation and Molecular Characterization of Thermophilic Actinomyctes and Investigation of their Effects in Compost Mixtures" investigated enzyme and parameter based Streptomyces sp. selection criteria for use in compost mixtures. Isolation of Actinobacteria from compost mixtures was the first step in the present study. Soil and activated sludge, were utilized as microorganism source and micoorganisms sampled at different temperatures were isolated via dilution plate technique. 84 isolates were obtained after consecutive isolation, incubation, single colony reducing, and purficiation steps and these were initailly tested for their enymatic activity. Enzyme tests and morphological analyses were interpreted in accordance to reduce total number of microorganisms to 21. Detailed morphological analyses were utilized in comparing micoorganism production in the presence of various medium. 15 isolates were further analyzed via 16S rRNA sequencing and three isolates were selected following the results of enzyme tests. Parametre based selection tests were composed of microorganism development in the presence of various temperature and pH values, growth on different carbon sources and urea hydrolyses of microorganisms were also determined in the course of studies. Cellulose, starch and ksilane degradation were preferred for enzyme tests and micoroganisms coded as N3C07 (A), T4A05 (B) and N4A13 (C) were utilized in compost experiments. Highest organic matter degradation was obtained in the presence of single microorganism utilization. Binary systems indicated organic matter degradation close to control system. Organic matter degradation in the presence of triple system was lower than control. Germination Index utilized for determination of compost maturity revealed low GI % values for cucumber while high performance was obtained with wheat. Results indicated that micororganisms had been more effective than control. The increase in composting effciency via microorganism utilization as the highlight of thesis study