Screening bioactive secondary metabolites from Costa Rican enviromental microbial communities

Our group at the University of Costa Rica has started an initiative to explore the microbial diversity of our country making a screening campaign towards biological evaluation of organic extracts from different environmental microbial communities. Our collection of microbial isolates currently has more than 300 microorganisms, including bacteria, actinomycetes and fungi. Those microbes have been isolated from diverse sources like insects, insect's nests, soil, frog skins and extreme environments. We have started the process of small-scale fermentation, extraction and biological evaluation. Preliminary results, including entomopathogenic bacteria Photorabdus temperata and Xenorhabdus sp, will be presented. Future plans include expansion of our microbial and organic extract collection as well as testing using new biological assays.