Phenazine-Producing Pseudomonas aeruginosa OQ158909: A Promising Candidate for Biological Activity and Therapeutic Applications

Abstract

Natural phenazines, as secondary metabolites of microorganisms, have recently gained much attention for their potential application as biologically active antimicrobial compounds. The present study was performed in order to investigate the production of a biologically active phenazine compound by a locally isolated strain of Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Thirty different strains were isolated from soil and water on a selective medium. From them, isolate 14-WANRC, was selected due to its high productivity of colored secondary metabolites after 5 days of incubation in King-A broth medium. The isolate was further identified using some morphological, biochemical and physiological tests as well as using 16S-rDNA which revealed a 99% similarity with Pseudomonas aeruginosa and was therefore registered in the Gene bank under the accession number of OQ158909. The production ability of the studied strain was then improved by studying the effect of different physiological and growth conditions. The results showed that the maximum output of phenazine compounds was obtained when the isolated strain was cultivated in mineral salt medium (MS), under shaking conditions of 100 rpm, for five days at 35°C. The secondary metabolites produced were finally extracted using ethyl acetate and subjected to TLC for compounds separation. The selected band exhibited potent antimicrobial, antioxidant and anticancer activities.