Basic antibacterial assay to screen for bacteriocinogenic lactic acid bacteria and to elementarily characterize their bacteriocins

Abstract

Bacteriocins ribosomally produced by lactic acid bacteria are antibacterial peptides expected to be used as a safe biopreservative and a fermentation controller in food industry. The modified agar-well diffusion method is most frequently used for antibacterial activity assay to screen for potentially bacteriocin-producing strains and to elementarily characterize their bacteriocins and the relatives. Here, I describe procedure of the modified agar-well diffusion assay in the details.