Abstract

Bacterial microbiota is predominantly present in all living organisms. Mostof the bacteria present in the gut of the fish are contaminating the foodchain. In the present study, we aimed to isolate and characterize thebacteria in the gut of Epinephelus sp. in the red sea of Jeddah, Kingdom ofSaudi Arabia. Bacteria were isolated from the guts of 10 fish samples andwere grown on Luria Bertani (LB) and nutrient agar media. Total thirteenbacterial colonies were screen out by morphological identification i.e.,color, shape, structure, etc. which were further reduced to 7 colonies e.g.,IF001, IF002, F003, IF004, F005, IF006, and IF007. The bacterial isolateswere also identified through molecular identification using 16S-rDNAsequencing. The genomic DNA was isolated and was sequenced using theSanger sequencing method. BLAST alignment results that IF001 and IF002were members Bacillussp. IF003 was a strain of photobacterium damselae,IF004 and IF006 were strains of Rothia endophytica, IF005 was a strain of Acinetobacter bouvetiiand IF007 was belonged to Shewanella oneidensis.The molecular identification confirmed the identification of bacterialisolates in the Epinephelussp. obtained from the red sea.

Keywords: Epinephelus sp., morphological identification, molecular identification, bacterial microflora.