Over the past six decades, coastal wetlands in China have experienced rapid and extensive agricultural reclamation. In the context of saline conditions, long-term effect of cultivation after reclamation on soil chemical properties has not been well understood. We studied this issue using a case of approximately 60-years cultivation of a coastal saline marsh in Bohai Rim, northern China. The res...

A hollow-fiber membrane chamber (HFMC) was developed as an in situ cultivation device for environmental microorganisms. The HFMC system consists of 48 to 96 pieces of porous hollow-fiber membrane connected with injectors. The system allows rapid exchange of chemical compounds, thereby simulating a natural environment. Comparative analysis through the cultivation of three types of environmental ...

In this study, two thermal-tolerant mutants of Chlorella sp. MT-7 and MT-15, were isolated. In indoor cultivation, specific growth rate (micro, d(-1)) of the mutants were 1.4 to 1.8-fold at 25 degrees Celsius and 3.3 to 6.7-fold at 40 degrees Celsius higher than those of wild type. The carbon dioxide fixation rate of both microalgal mutants was also significantly higher than that of wild type. ...

BACKGROUND The causative pathogens of healthcare-associated pneumonia (HCAP) remain controversial, and the use of conventional cultivation of sputum samples is occasionally inappropriate due to the potential for oral bacterial contamination. It is also sometimes difficult to determine whether methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is a true causative pathogen of HCAP. METHODS We e...

BACKGROUND The eukaryotic RNase ribonuclease/angiogenin inhibitors (RI) are a protein group distinguished by a unique structure - they are composed of hydrophobic leucine-rich repeat motifs (LRR) and contain a high amount of reduced cysteine residues. The members of this group are difficult to produce in E. coli and other recombinant hosts due to their high aggregation tendency. RESULTS In th...

BACKGROUND Probiotic bacteria are becoming an important tool for improving human health, controlling diseases and enhancing immune responses. The availability of a cost effective cultivation conditions has profound effect on the efficiency and role of probiotic bacteria. Therefore the current study was conducted with an objective to develop a low cost growth medium for enhancing the biomass pro...

BACKGROUND Microorganisms can adapt to perturbations of the surrounding environment to grow. To analyze the adaptation process of the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae to a high ethanol concentration, repetitive cultivation was performed with a stepwise increase in the ethanol concentration in the culture medium. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS First, a laboratory strain of S. cerevisiae was cult...

Extensive expansion of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) for cell-based therapies remains challenging since long-term cultivation and excessive passaging in two-dimensional conditions result in a loss of essential stem cell properties. Indeed, low survival rate of cells, alteration of surface marker profiles, and reduced differentiation capacity are observed after in vitro expansion and reduce ther...