Abstract

A gram negative, motile, short rod-shaped, and nickel resistant (tolerating 6.5 mM Ni2+) bacterium, strain BB1A, was isolated from the waters of the River Torsa in Hashimara, Jalpaiguri district, West Bengal, India. The isolate BB1A was identified as a strain of Acinetobacter junii following detailed analysis of morphological, physio-biochemical and 16S rRNA gene sequence. The expression of nickel resistance in BB1A was inducible by exposure to nickel chloride at a concentration as low as 50 μM Ni2+. The other metal ions, Cu2+, Zn2+, or Pb2+ at a concentration range of 20–30 μM, also induced the nickel resistance system in this bacterium. Southern hybridizations of BB1A genomic DNA with digoxigenin-dUTP labeled DNA probes specific for well known nickel resistance determinants, cnr, ncc or nre, resulted in no detectable signal, but nir specific probe yielded weak hybridization signal with restricted genomic DNA of BB1A. The isolate BB1A, therefore, carries out a novel induction phenomenon of nickel resistance and presumably with a nickel resistance genetic system different from that previously characterized in other bacteria.

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