Antibiotic production in soilborne microorganisms

Antibiotic resistance is a growing global problem due to oversight by international governments and pharmaceutical companies. By 2050, it is estimated that antibiotic-resistant bacteria will kill more people every year that diabetes and cancer combined according to Tackling Drug Resistant Infections Globally: Final Report and Recommendations. There are six main species of concern per the CDC, Enterococcus faecalis, Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Acinetobacter baumannii, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Enterobacter sp. also referred to as the ESKAPE pathogens. The task of discovering new antibiotics has been left to nonprofits like the Small World Initiative, which also works in tandem with high schools and universities by isolating secondary metabolites from bacteria collected from soil, water, and agricultural samples. The main producers of these secondary metabolites with antibiotic properties are bacteria within the genus Streptomyces. Using these methods, I was able to isolate three bacterial species and two fungal species, which unfortunately did not produce any secondary metabolites.