9362058 Bochner Anaerobic bacteria possess metabolic activities for biodegrading a range of polluting chemicals including aromatic chemicals, halogenated aromatics, and halogenated alkenes. Anaerobes make up a significant portion of terrestrial bacteria and should be considered as potential agents of bioremediation, but our knowledge of these organisms, their diversity, taxonomy, and metabolic capabilities, is still at a rudimentary level. An efficient, easy- to-use, instrumented test kit system that can be used both to study the catabolic capabilities of anaerobes and to identify different species of anaerobes based on those capabilities will be developed. The catabolic potential of over 300 species of anaerobes against nearly 200 organic chemicals will be surveyed and cataloged. From computer analysis of this data, a set of 95 carbon source utilization tests will be selected that ultimately will be incorporated into a commercial microplate test kit. %%% The survey will provide an overview of the range of catabolic activities of anaerobes, and the instrumented test kit system will be marketed commercially to microbiologists doing environmental, industrial, and medical testing and identification of anaerobes. ***
