AHMED ABD BURGHAL, WIJDAN HUSSEIN AL-TAMIMI AND SAAD SHAKIR MAHDI AL-AMARA
Abstract
The biodiversity and genetic identification of hydrocarbon-degrading microbes is a significant initiation to the bioremediation of contaminated soil. The aim of this study is screening the microbiome community with a high adaptability of bacterial strains grown in extreme crude oil contaminated soil of the South of Basrah. The molecular identification of recovered bacterial isolates based on 16S rRNA sequencing indicated to isolation a novel Kocuria flava strain, identified as Basra AWS with accession number Ku715984 in the Gene Bank data. The main features of this isolate are Gram-positive, large cocci, arranged in different forms. The new strain exhibited a significant performance in crude destruction through consuming 70% of crude oil within 10 days of incubation. We can conclude register a novel bacterial strain with a notable capability in hydrocarbon remediation.