Journal of Environment and Sociobiology

Satadal Chakrabarty ¹, Atul Kumar Saha ¹

Affiliations
1 Central Sericultural Research and Training Institute, Berhampore (W.B.), IN

Abstract

A unique strain of the microbe, Staphylococcus vitulinus has been isolated from the ‘flacherie’ infected silkworm, Bombyx mori L. It is a yellow-pigmented Gram +ve bacteria, measuring about 1.0-1.5 μm, and can survive in a wide range of temperatue (4-37°C) and pH (5.0-8.0). An apparently harmless bacteria, can be highly pathogenic to cause ‘flacherie’ disease of the silkworm, i.e., flaccid condition in silkworm inflicting high degree of larval mortality and serious threat to sericulture. Total nucleotides in the genome of the bacteria are 1426, and the BLAST analysis of 16S rRNA showed 100 per cent pair-wise similarity with Staphylococcus vitulinus strain ATCC 51145(T). This bacteria has been found to cause ‘flacherie’ in silkworm for the first time. Biochemical tests of the bacteria for oxidase demonstrated difference with other representatives of the genus Staphylococcus as it showed positive reaction for oxidase. No other difference has, however, been found with the species Staphylococcus vitulinus, and hence the strain has been designated as a new subspecies, bombycis under Staphylococcus vitulinus.

Keywords

Flacherie, Staphylococcus, Bombyx mori, Gram positive bacteria, Gene sequence.

Full Text