Germination and characterization of Bacillus anthracis and Bacillus cereus

Bacillus cereus and Bacillus anthracis are micro organisms found in soil. Normally, only their spores are found in soil. We recently showed that, B. anthracis and B. cereus do not germinate in soil. Thus, how does B. cereus and B. anthracis continue their life cycle if they can not replicate in soil? We hypothesize that B. cereus and B. anthracis spores may germinate in the gut of nematodes. Caenorhabditis elegans was used as our model nematode to investigate this possibility. Subsequently, the goal of our research is to determine the effect of C. elegans on the life cycle of B. anthracis and B. cereus. Three sets of experiments were attempted. Synchronized cultures of C. elegans strain N2 and BA1 was used to determine if B. anthracis and B. cereus have a significant effect on the lifespan of nematodes. Co-plating B. anthracis/B. cereus, B. cereus/E.coli and B. anthracis/E.coli enabled us to find out which food source was preferred over the other and in what conditions. Finally, B. anthracis spore germination was monitored in real time by feeding C. elegans with a B. anthracis strain that fluorescence\u27s upon germination