Isolation of Pigment-Producing Bacteria and Characterization of the Extracted Pigments

Bacteria produce pigments for various reasons and it plays an important role. Some bacteria such as cyanobacteria have phycobilin pigments to carry out photosynthesis. Other example for pigment-producing bacterial strains includes Serratia marcescens that produces prodigiosin, Streptomyces coelicolor (prodigiosin and actinorhodin), Chromobacterium violaceum (violacein) and Thialkalivibrio versutus (natronochrome and chloronatronochrome). These bacteria can be isolated/ cultured/purified from various environmental sources such as water bodies, soil, on plant, in insects and in man or animal. Various growth mediums can be used to isolate different types of bacteria. However, due to the high cost of using synthetic medium, there is a need to develop new low cost process for the production of pigments as well as during the isolation procedure. The use of agro-industrial residues for example, would provide a profitable means of reducing substrate cost. Pigment produced by the bacteria can be isolated using solvent extraction. These pigments can be further purified and characterized for physical and chemical characteristics using various instrumental-based analytical techniques such as TLC, UV–vis Spectroscopy, FTIR, ESI–MS, NMR HPLC and Gel Permeation Chromatography.