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Nitroblue Tetrazolium (NBT) Reduction by Bacteria
Author(s) -
Urban Teresa,
Jarstrand Connie
Publication year - 1979
Publication title -
acta pathologica microbiologica scandinavica section b microbiology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.909
H-Index - 88
eISSN - 1600-0463
pISSN - 0304-131X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1699-0463.1979.tb02431.x
Subject(s) - formazan , bacteria , nitroblue tetrazolium , chemistry , tetrazolium chloride , microbiology and biotechnology , biochemistry , biology , medicine , genetics , ischemia
All the S. albus, E. coli and P. aeruginosa strains examined reduced nitroblue tetrazolium (NBT) to dark blue formazan. The amount of formazan produced was proportional to the number of bacteria. Under the same growth conditions, an equal number of bacteria of various strains produced different amounts of formazan. However, there were statistically verified differences in the NBT‐reduction between the three species examined. The NBT‐reduction took place in all phases of growth but was most intense in the early logarithmic phase. NBT was found to be toxic for bacteria, and the different strains had varying sensitivity to that effect. The NBT‐reaction was markedly enhanced by phenazine methosulphate (PMS). The blue colour of formazan produced from NBT has an advantage over the red colour from triphenyltetrazolium chloride (TTC) if the reaction occurs in the presence of haemoglobin often present in biological materials. With NBT and PMS, 10 6 –10 7 bacteria are needed to form detectable amounts of formazan. The NBT‐reduction by bacteria may be useful for measuring the influence of bactericidal, bacteriostatic or growth‐stimulating factors on bacteria.