Science Fair: Help Needed

[Advait Patil]

Hi,

I am doing a science fair project on how the salinity affects the amount of oil degraded by the bacterium bacillus subtilis, and I have a few questions:

Is my project feasible on the scale I am doing? I will be adding 5g motor oil to each cup, and I will be growing the bacteria in each cup for a period of twenty days. Will the bacteria consume a significant amount of oil, or should I scale down my experiment?

I have also researched two other bacteria:

-Rhodococcus rhodochrous 

-Micrococcus luteus

Please tell me if these bacteria grow anaerobically, and what the pros and cons of each are. Also, it would be great if you could point me to some bacteria that are anaerobic, non-pathogenic, degrade oil, and are available at a low cost.

If there are no other bacteria you know of for my project, please tell me where to get a rotator for a relatively low cost, as B. subtilis is aerobic and I need to keep mixing it with air so it will degrade the oil.

Thanks!

Regards,

Advait Patil

[Mega [Andreas Stuermer]]

Some bacteria degrade oil by a plasmid that carries a "toluol degrading enzyme" that also has other degrading genes or the enzyme degrades other hydrocarbons.

Make sure to add some water, because bacteria won't grow in pure oil ;)  You perhaps already know.