Abstract

Pigments play an important role in physiological and molecular processes such as photosynthesis, survival to oxidative damage and resistance to ultra violet radiation in microorganisms. This study isolated and characterized pigment produced by Bacillus subtilis PD5 from soil sample of rice field. The pigment was extracted using three solvent system, namely, methanol, n-hexane and ethyl acetate. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) technique was used for pigment characterization, while beta carotene was taken as standard. The molecular identification of bacterial strain was done by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) amplification of 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis. Sequence was submitted to National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) database with accession number KY306687. Sequence analysis showed that the PD5 bacterial strain which produce red pigment is a novel strain of B. subtilis with 98 to 99% similarity. FTIR analysis of extracted red pigment showed similarity with beta carotene, indicating that the pigment is a derivative of carotenoid.

Key words: Bacillus subtilis PD5, 16S rRNA, Red pigment, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR).