Identification and antimicrobial activity of actinobacteria from soils in southern Thailand.

The aim of this research was to study on the identification and antimicrobial activity of actinobacteria from six soil samples collected around Krung Ching waterfall, Nakhon Si Thammarat province, the southern part of Thailand. Thirty-one isolates of actinobacteria were isolated using the dilution plating method on modified starch casein nitrate agar plates and potato starch-glycerol agar plates. On the primary screening, 9 isolates exhibited the antimicrobial activity against Bacillus subtilis, 8 isolates against Kocuria rhizophila, 6 isolates against Mucor racemosus, 2 isolates against Escherichia coli and Candida albicans and 5 isolates against Xanthomonas campestris pv. oryzae. All the isolates were identified based on their morphological and cultural characteristics including the 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis. Eighteen isolates were identified as Streptomyces, 8 isolates as Nocardia, 2 isolates as Kitasatospora, one of each isolate as Amycolatopsis, Rhodococcus and Gordonia.