Biodegradation of malathion by Bacillus licheniformis strain ML-1

Abstract

Malathion, a well-known organophosphate pesticide, has been used in agriculture over the last two decades for controlling pests of economically important crops. In the present study, a single bacterium, ML-1, was isolated by soilenrichment technique and identified as Bacillus licheniformis on the basis of the 16S rRNA technique. The bacterium was grown in carbon-free minimal salt medium (MSM) and was found to be very efficient in utilizing malathion as the sole source of carbon. Biodegradation experiments were performed in MSM without carbon source to determine the malathion degradation by the selected strain, and the residues of malathion were determined quantitatively using HPLC techniques. Bacillus licheniformis showed very promising results and efficiently consumed malathion as the sole carbon source via malathion carboxylesterase (MCE), and about 78% malathion was degraded within 5 days. The carboxylesterase activity was determined by using crude extract while using malathion as substrate, and the residues were determined by HPLC. It has been found that the MCE hydrolyzed 87% malathion within 96 h of incubation. Characterization of crude MCE revealed that the enzyme is robust in nature in terms of organic solvents, as it was found to be stable in various concentrations of ethanol and acetonitrile. Similarly, and it can work in a wide pH and temperature range. The results of this study highlighted the potential of Bacillus licheniformis strain ML-1 as a biodegrader that can be used for the bioremediation of malathion-contaminated soil.

The potentiality of Lysinibacillus sphaericus DM-3 and Bacillus cereus DM-5 in degrading dimethoate

“…The previously recorded bacteria degrading OP compounds are mainly Bacillus species, such as B. licheniformis, B. pumilus, B. safensis, B. subtilis and B. cereus (Mandal et al, 2005;Singh et al, 2006;Khan et al, 2016 andBegum et al, 2016). On contrary, few studies have pointed to the role of Lysinibacillus spp.…”

Preparation of Stable Cross-Linked Enzyme Aggregates (CLEAs) of a Ureibacillus thermosphaericus Esterase for Application in Malathion Removal from Wastewater

“…Typically, the microbial biodegradation of malathion (up to 50-80%) takes from a few hours up to a few days (Table 8) if the liquid culture is used. For example, B. licheniformis strain ML-1 provided about 78% malathion removal from liquid media within five days [8]. Carboxylesterase D1CarE5 from the bacterium Alicyclobacillus tengchongensis, which was cloned in pET28a (+) and expressed in E. coli BL21(DE3), revealed the high capability to hydrolyze malathion: the removal of malathion was 89% within 100 min at its initial concentration of 5 mg L −1 [11].…”

“…Currently, biological treatment is considered as a preferred method for malathion removal from aqueous solutions, since it is inexpensive, less time-consuming, and in most cases, provides complete degradation of this insecticide. A wide range of bacteria, including Bacillus licheniformis [8], Pseudomonas putida, Pseudomonas sp. [9], Rhodoccocus rhodochrous, and Sphingomonas sp.…”

Soil Microorganisms and Their Potential in Pesticide Biodegradation; A Review Article

“…(Azmy, Saafan, Essam, Amin and Ahmed, 2015) Bacillus sp. (Ishag et al, 2016;Khan et al, 2016) Staphylococcus vitulinus (Kadhim, Rabee and Abdalraheem, 2015) Pseudomonas putida (Kadhim et al, 2015) Pyrethroid Cypermethrin Bacillus sp Soil (Murugesan, Jeyasanthi and Maheswari, 2010;Pankaj et al, 2016;Xiao et al, 2015) Pseudomonas sp (Chen et al, 2015;Malik, Singh and Bhatia, 2009) Corynebacterium (Shaohua Chen, Meiying Hu, et al, 2011;Murugesan, Jeyasanthi and Maheswari, 2010) Ochrobactrum sp. (Shaohua Chen, Meiying Hu, et al, 2011) Deltamethrin Acinetobacter sp.…”