Studies on metal microbe interaction of three bacterial isolates from east Calcutta wetland

Abstract

The present paper put forth the isolation and complete characterization of three bacterial isolates from different sites of East Calcutta Wetland (ECW). These isolates show tolerance to heavy metals like Ag, Al, Cu, Cr, Co, Ni, Pb and were found to be efficient metal accumulators as evident from Energy Dispersive X Ray Fluorescence (EDXRF) analysis and Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM). Beyond intracellular accumulation, these isolates also show metal deposition in form of particles inside the cells which can further open up the area of microbe fabricated nanoparticle generation. The heavy metal accumulation in the cell can trigger different response mechanism such as change in cell morphology which was observed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The metal uptake property of these isolates can be applied for the heavy metal removal and recovery from industrial effluents. © 2007 Science Publications.